I am also participating on the Website Committee for the James Fenimore Cooper Society. For much more comprehensive information on Cooper, see the James Fenimore Cooper Society webpage , hosted by SUNY Oneonta. For me, Cooper provides an interesting frame of reference, a fortress against idiocy in the academic world, as well as the world at large. Whatever his faults as a writer of fiction, Cooper is almost always vigorous, challenging, intelligent, fair, yet decisive. His honesty about human nature is refreshing.
Cooper is a serious, even profound artist.