A Comparative Study Of The Last Of The Mohicans And Dances With Wolves From The Perspective Of Postcolonial Ecocriticism

The Last of the Mohicans,published in 1826,is a masterpiece of American writer Cooper.Dances with Wolves,published in 1988,is a well-known novel of American writer Michael Blake.Both of these American novels are related to Indian culture that is an indispensable part of American culture.Therefore,many experts and scholars have interpreted these novels from different perspectives.However,little comparative study has been done between them,let alone from the perspective of postcolonial ecocriticism.This thesis aims to present a comparative study of two American novels from the perspective of postcolonial ecocriticism.The two books were published roughly 1.5centuries apart,so the comparison is paradigmatic,i.e.historical or chronological,rather than synchronic,i.e.spacial and concurrent.The purpose is to discover changes in American society,culture and ideology.The thesis consists of six chapters.Chapter One is introduction,which gives a brief account of the research background and significance of the study.Chapter Two explicates some theoretical terms and then conducts a survey of literature.Chapter Three discusses the similarities between the two fictional works from the perspective of postcolonial ecocriticism.The first similarity is that both stories describe harmonious relations between Amerindians and nature.The second one is that both books show disharmonious relations between white men and nature.The third one is that both literary works embody a sense of white men superiority and Euro-centrism.Chapter Four pins down the major differences between the two novels.The first difference is that the two books present different images of Amerindians.The Last of the Mohicans portrays Indians as immoral savages whereas Dances with Wolves depicts Indians as brave,warmhearted and wise.The second difference is that the two fictions indicate different white-Indian relations.Cooper's novel puts white men always in a leading position and Indians as followers whereas Michael Blake's noveldelineates the white protagonist and his Indian friends as fellow human beings.The third difference is that the two stories convey different messages.The Last of the Mohicans pushes colonialism with its seemingly exciting episodes whereas Dances with Wolves embodies postcolonial ecocriticism.Chapter Five traces the differences between the two novels to the causal factors and points out two factors.The first is that the two writers held drastically different value systems and the second is that the two authors lived in the midst of different social environments.Social environment can be further divided into two aspects,i.e.setting and ideology.Cooper lived during the time of westward movement when immigrants were still attached to Euro-centrism whereas Michael Blake lived after W.W.II when people were disillusioned about control and order,and looked at people and things in a more realistic light.Ideologically,White Americans' collective way of thinking was dominated by Euro-centrism in the time of Cooper whereas by the time of Michael Blake,new ideas like existentialism,postcolonialism and ecocriticism entered the American mind so that the American ideology became more liberal and less rigid.Chapter Six concludes the thesis by recapitulating the major points in the thesis,and naming two limitations.The two limitations include(a)lack of synchronic comparison with novels of other nations and(b)the postcolonial ecocritical analysis is confined to fictions set in nature.