In this original study, Geoffrey Sanborn presents a fresh interpretation of the villanous Magua in James Fenimore Cooper's The Last of the Mohicans (1826) and of the dignified harpooner Queequeg in Herman Melville's Moby-Dick (1851). Through careful historical research, Sanborn has determined that both authors relied heavily on contemporary accounts of the indigenous natives of New Zealand, the Maori, to develop their iconic characters. Cooper drew heavily on the account of Te Aara in John Liddiard Nicholas's Narrative of a Voyage to New Zealand (1817) while Melville studied the personal...

Geoffrey Sanborn's edition of Clotel highlights the complexity of the novel's composition and its place in 19th-century print and performance culture.