With the relatively minor exceptions of David Gamut, Colonel Munro, and Uncas, the characters in The Last of the Mohicans are static ones. We learn more about them as the novel progresses, not because they develop within themselves, but because through their talk, actions, descriptions, and sometimes authorial comment Cooper reveals more about them to us. Many American writers — Hawthorne, Melville, Hemingway, and others — emphasize change in character, with concentration on growth and development. Why does Cooper do so little with this?
One reason is the influence of the sentimental novel, in which a character and desires, even when fulfilled, are approximately the same. He begins and ends with these concerns, these needs in the face of difficulties which must be and usually are overcome. Thus Major Heyward remains the same throughout, always, in relation to the frontier, the outsider primarily aware of his love for Alice; he undergoes no change from his frontier experience, and his attitude toward miscegenation is unaltered although it involves someone very close to him indeed. Other features of stereotyped sentimentalism abound: the delicate, flower-like Alice Munro swoons at the most inopportune times of crisis; her beloved Heyward sometimes postures and blusters with the best of intentions; the conflict between absolute good and absolute bad is sometimes too obvious and pat. Sentimentalism, however, does not explain the static quality of more important characters.
