James Fenimore Cooper was inspired by a tale related to him by neighbor and family friend John Jay. It was more successful and became a bestseller; the setting of this Revolutionary War tale is widely believed to have been John Jay's family home "The Locusts" in Rye, New York. In 1823, Cooper published "The Pioneers", the first of the "Leatherstocking" series. The series features Natty Bumppo, a resourceful American woodsman at home with the Delaware Indians and their chief Chingachgook. Bumppo was also the main character of Cooper's most famous novel "The Last of the Mohicans" (1826), written in New York City where
The Monikins The Monikins The Monikins is an 1835 novel, written by James Fenimore Cooper. The novel, a beast fable, was written between his composition of two of his more famous novels from the "Leatherstocking Tales", "The Prairie" and "The Pathfinder". Critic Christina Starobin compares the novel's plot to Jonathan Swift's "Gulliver's Travels". The novel, narrated by the main character, the English Sir John Goldencalf, is a satire. Goldencalf and the American captain Noah Poke travel on a series of humorous adventures. The novel is not very popular amongst readers of Cooper. A contemporary critic of the novel in "The Knickerbocker" described