A Study on the Importance of Native Indian Presence in American Literature

Abstract

A study of the use of the image of the Native Indian, for almost two hundred years on both sides of the Atlantic being traced, the reason for the sudden prominence given to the Native Indians in American literary works after the war of 1812 and for almost half a century on, is revealed through the present study. The works of Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper, and Nathaniel Hawthorne are used to strengthen my premise. Hawthorne uses a technique different from the other authors who focus directly on the Native Indians to prove their importance in American literature. Hawthorne’s novel The Scarlet Letter is used to understand his method. For this, a basic understanding of the plot being required, the storyline of the novel is concisely unfolded through a narrative analysis deriving from a qualitative approach. The presence of the Native Indian in The Scarlet Letter being examined it explains Hawthorne’s unique method used to establish the significance of the Natives Indians in American literature thereby illustrating their surge in status in the American literary domain.