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Precaution
Some of our greatest novelists have launched their careers by what seems the least likely means -- that of the wager. In American letters there is no stronger example than that to be found in the life of James Fenimore Cooper -- who made the wager that he could write a better story than the sort of fashionable romances he and his wife were then reading together! The result was Precaution -- the novel that set Cooper upon his long and successful career. Ostensibly written by an Englishman, and containing the styling and attitudes of the English popular novels of the time, Precaution prepared the ground for Cooper's great successes to follow -- which were to be thoroughly American in their flavor.
348 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1820
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About the author
James Fenimore Cooper
4,640 books1,115 followersJames Fenimore Cooper was a popular and prolific American writer. He is best known for his historical novel The Last of the Mohicans, one of the Leatherstocking Tales stories, and he also wrote political fiction, maritime fiction, travelogues, and essays on the American politics of the time. His daughter Susan Fenimore Cooper was also a writer.
Series:
* The Leatherstocking Tales
* The Littlepage Manuscripts
* Afloat and Ashore
* Homeward Bound
Series:
* The Leatherstocking Tales
* The Littlepage Manuscripts
* Afloat and Ashore
* Homeward Bound
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Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews
April 16, 2021
Precaution or Persuasion , I was wondering what word rings better to me these days! H’m. Hard to decide. But it is easy for me to decide that Precaution is an interesting and a spirited performance, if not for studying, at least for reading. As the first of his plentiful of works I feel that James Fenimore Cooper did his best when working on it (although not equally so throughout), and it especially amused me to read that the trigger to write this book was based on a domestic situation: it seems that he was reading a contemporary English novel, and he told his wife, “I believe I could write a better story myself’ , so his wife made him the challenge, which eventually was converted in the outcome of Precaution , as published in 1820.
Even if Cooper is not Austen (though I read somewhere that even this novel was put originally under the signature of a female writer), the story of the novel is of English society life, and it feels like the subject follows very closely the English model of such novels. Moreover, the work can easily be classified as a novel of manners, or a didactic novel emphasizing and tending to prove the great importance of early education, in cultivating religious and moral principles.
The title is taken from the attitude of a protector (that is Mrs Wilson, a general widow and sister of a baronet) who constantly warns her charges (and especially Ms Emily Moseley, daughter of a baronet) to be “exceedingly careful as to the moral standards of their suitors, and to exercise the greatest precaution in the selection of their husbands.” Nonetheless, all the chief incidents – namely the misunderstanding and perplexities – seem to be the result of this excessive precaution, and serve to show its undesirability.
Overall, the atmosphere is that of high society, and the scenes and houses in which the action takes place are fashionable, too :) At least some change of landscape with regard to our modern times, lately bleak and gloomy, even from the season point of view.
I liked very much that the writing style is remarkably easy and flowing. Also, as this ensured I got the needed dose of humour to lighten up my mood – is the fact that the whole novel abounds in fashionable, insipid and generally stupid (pardon! I seem to exaggerate here because I really very much liked Mr Benfield and his steward, who are perfect originals) characters who seem to be occupied almost entirely with gossip and match-making, especially the latter, while occasionally a bit of villainy is introduced to sustain the interest and furnish the requisite thrills.
Oh, yes, thrills! Oh, how well I remember those thrills! :D
For example, this one (the thrill I mean) is very good: we have here the faultless heroine Emily who is wooed by an earl in disguise. The adventures embarked upon by the famous earl – that is the noble hero, Lord Pendennyss (what a lovely name!) – are quite extraordinary, but not to the level of “The last of the Mohicans”. Anyway, when the rank of the hero is disclosed our heroine falls “senseless on the sofa” from the shock. I fancied to put myself in a similar situation and I realized I am not going to faint, not a bit, I am absolutely devastated by this! oh I wish I could faint! At least, once :D
Like the characters, the plot is conventional and commonplace. Nothing to be worried, I liked it so. There is a great number of characters and various incidents that complicate the plot, and make it rather hard to follow intelligently, and the whole is very uneven, but I liked that too. Moreover, the story is wildly impossible in some parts and wearisomely monotonous in others. Surprisingly, I found myself liking it :) But of course, let’s be fair: the plot is too melodramatic and cannot come under the head of the manners plot “par excellence”, as found in the plots of Austen.
I found the book very laughable as in my opinion the author indulges in very nice witticisms, and especially where he seems to approve of the emphasis upon sensibility, propriety, good manners, good taste and form, even though he was an American. We have here a blending, better to say alloy, between a moral tale and a society novel, where all the leading characters furnish moral examples either by serving as awful warnings, or by preaching a species of narrow theology and ethics. Dear Mrs Wilson is the best representative of this latter type, as she maintains a most superior moral attitude towards the world in general, and who not only insists upon precaution in regard to marriage, but also on the indispensability of piety in a husband, while in the wife it is taken for granted.
Finally, in concluding my thoughts (which are so few and random) on this work of fiction, the chances of enjoying a high(er) entertainment with my next reads of Cooper are likely to be much greater, starting from the thought that a writer should normally get better and better in his next works. In other words, I don’t follow or I am entirely not of the opinion that, “prevention is better than cure” :D
February 10, 2023
Feb 9, 10pm ~~ Nope.
Can't do it.
Even if Cooper is an author project for 2023, this first novel is not at all to my taste.
One reviewer has said that the final hundred pages are wonderful.
I will take their word for it.
I managed to pay attention through about five of the forty-nine chapters, then skimmed quickly through another five or six, enough to see that this wannabe Jane Austen novel was not turning into anything that was at all interesting for me.
Precaution was published in 1820. The next title on my Cooper list is The Spy, published in 1821, so after a little break with some other author to cleanse my book palate a bit, I will come back and give Cooper another try.
DNF after ten chapters.
Can't do it.
Even if Cooper is an author project for 2023, this first novel is not at all to my taste.
One reviewer has said that the final hundred pages are wonderful.
I will take their word for it.
I managed to pay attention through about five of the forty-nine chapters, then skimmed quickly through another five or six, enough to see that this wannabe Jane Austen novel was not turning into anything that was at all interesting for me.
Precaution was published in 1820. The next title on my Cooper list is The Spy, published in 1821, so after a little break with some other author to cleanse my book palate a bit, I will come back and give Cooper another try.
DNF after ten chapters.
December 16, 2017
Apparently, this book had myriad errors when it went to press, and was not properly edited (why James Fenimore Cooper let that happen is anybody's guess), but I had been assured by the venerable Lord Gosford that the text had been sufficiently cleaned up to ensure an enjoyable read. Gosford has impeccable credibility-more or less.
The first chapter introduces us to a bevy of characters, which included not only the core main characters, but the new neighbors down the road who would figure prominently in the story. The withering array of characters right off the bat coupled with the deficiencies alluded to makes chapter 1 a tough read. I created a little cheat sheet that I referred to for several chapters to keep score. It worked.
My understanding is that this was Cooper's first novel, English style in the way of Jane Austen & co. He was successful in that way, but as in most of these types of victorian English stories, a plot line was hard to delineate, and you depended on the characters being interesting. With the number of characters in the story, some were interesting, some were not.
One of the interesting ones was old uncle Benfield, in a comic relief sort of way. Benfield appeared a bit senile, so you couldn't really take everything he said as absolute fact. Seemed like the present reminded him of the past, no matter how absurd the disconnect that he forced. I wonder how Lord Gosford would have felt about being a punchline that lasted almost the entire book.
Unlike the two Jane Austen books I've read (Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion), this book had a bit more action, if you can call it that. Maybe a better description would be mystery or intrigue. A mysterious young man shows up at the local rectors place with a sick old man, and pries his way into the social circle of the main characters. How trusting and gullible they are, for this guy was a secretive as they come. In fact, it seemed as if he was hiding something. Now that you mention it...
A prominent feature of any of these Victorian type novels is the horse race to get the girs married off to some handsome rich man. The Moseley's had three daughters, and they all were of age and on the hunt, so to speak. As luck would have it, there just happened to be three men in the vicinity that fit the bill. The oldest, Clara, shacked up with the rectors son, and Emily fell for the stranger (Denbingh), although what she saw in such a suspicious character only she would know. Jane, the other daughter fell for a soldier (Col. Egerton) that was staying with the new neighbors described earlier. The son of the new neighbors was the odd man out here, because he was a jerk. But as Tom Petty said, even the losers get lucky sometimes. Just not right away. Perfect! All is well, right? Anybody that has read any of Cooper's other books knows he's long winded (in a good sort of way), and short and to the point is absolutely not his style. All was not quite as well as it seemed for a moment.
Not being a short book, it was a little annoying that characters are described, but their name comes up later, not at the time of description, forcing you to go back and make the connections. If you have any plans to skim through this book, don't even start it. It's a slow read, not necessarily bad, but a little frustrating that the flow of the story bottles up here and there. Considering the ultimate convolution of the story, taking your time reading this would be the best policy.
The bouncing around in scenes began to get a little unweildy, considering they weren't that exciting for the most part. You really had to slow down to comprehend what was happening, and when you did you found that it was not much ado about anything. A little over half way through, Cooper introduces another set of characters that ultimately served as props for the main characters. That didn't stop him from going through their various stories, with pages of history regarding ancillary characters. Did I mention the characters needed to be interesting? The side characters for the most part were not, although the story would have more holes than it did if they weren't there. Despite the fact that you had to keep score with the characters being thrown your way, these people ultimately ran in a small circle. They continually ran into eachother at social events, vacations, etc. In order to fulfill appearances, they would hang out with those they despised. After all, the girls were husband hunters by trade, and this was the circle that they had to choose from. They just had to do a little digging to get to the diamonds.
If Cooper has any writing defects (and they are few; he's one of my favorites), it's that he will come up with ridiculously unlikely scenarios, here and in other books. Quasi-spoiler here (but not really). Denbingh, the mysterious (creepy?) guy of Emily's dreams runs into to Col. Egerton, not once, but twice in military battle, even saving his life at the battle of Waterloo. What are the odds. Well, slim to none, but again, it's one of Cooper's deficiencies, if you want to call it that (Mark Twain tore him apart in an epic tirade), but this if fiction, and Cooper has a style that will keep you engaged. My guess though is that the Flesch-Kincaid reading level is fairly substantial. Very readable though, but just a caveat for you skimmers.
In the end, we get the impression that everybody lives happily everafter. Then I thought of Denbingh, who was fresh back from a bloody encounter with Napoleon's French Army. Cooper never talks about him again, but such a gruesome experience must have affected him in some way. We can only speculate. At least he had hot Emily to make it better.
I give the book three stars. Very good for a first novel, even given the editing issues. I say this in the context of victorian English novels. If you're into that sort of thing, it's a pretty good book. If not, it'll be just as boring as any of the others, despite the smattering of action Cooper doles out here and there.
The first chapter introduces us to a bevy of characters, which included not only the core main characters, but the new neighbors down the road who would figure prominently in the story. The withering array of characters right off the bat coupled with the deficiencies alluded to makes chapter 1 a tough read. I created a little cheat sheet that I referred to for several chapters to keep score. It worked.
My understanding is that this was Cooper's first novel, English style in the way of Jane Austen & co. He was successful in that way, but as in most of these types of victorian English stories, a plot line was hard to delineate, and you depended on the characters being interesting. With the number of characters in the story, some were interesting, some were not.
One of the interesting ones was old uncle Benfield, in a comic relief sort of way. Benfield appeared a bit senile, so you couldn't really take everything he said as absolute fact. Seemed like the present reminded him of the past, no matter how absurd the disconnect that he forced. I wonder how Lord Gosford would have felt about being a punchline that lasted almost the entire book.
Unlike the two Jane Austen books I've read (Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion), this book had a bit more action, if you can call it that. Maybe a better description would be mystery or intrigue. A mysterious young man shows up at the local rectors place with a sick old man, and pries his way into the social circle of the main characters. How trusting and gullible they are, for this guy was a secretive as they come. In fact, it seemed as if he was hiding something. Now that you mention it...
A prominent feature of any of these Victorian type novels is the horse race to get the girs married off to some handsome rich man. The Moseley's had three daughters, and they all were of age and on the hunt, so to speak. As luck would have it, there just happened to be three men in the vicinity that fit the bill. The oldest, Clara, shacked up with the rectors son, and Emily fell for the stranger (Denbingh), although what she saw in such a suspicious character only she would know. Jane, the other daughter fell for a soldier (Col. Egerton) that was staying with the new neighbors described earlier. The son of the new neighbors was the odd man out here, because he was a jerk. But as Tom Petty said, even the losers get lucky sometimes. Just not right away. Perfect! All is well, right? Anybody that has read any of Cooper's other books knows he's long winded (in a good sort of way), and short and to the point is absolutely not his style. All was not quite as well as it seemed for a moment.
Not being a short book, it was a little annoying that characters are described, but their name comes up later, not at the time of description, forcing you to go back and make the connections. If you have any plans to skim through this book, don't even start it. It's a slow read, not necessarily bad, but a little frustrating that the flow of the story bottles up here and there. Considering the ultimate convolution of the story, taking your time reading this would be the best policy.
The bouncing around in scenes began to get a little unweildy, considering they weren't that exciting for the most part. You really had to slow down to comprehend what was happening, and when you did you found that it was not much ado about anything. A little over half way through, Cooper introduces another set of characters that ultimately served as props for the main characters. That didn't stop him from going through their various stories, with pages of history regarding ancillary characters. Did I mention the characters needed to be interesting? The side characters for the most part were not, although the story would have more holes than it did if they weren't there. Despite the fact that you had to keep score with the characters being thrown your way, these people ultimately ran in a small circle. They continually ran into eachother at social events, vacations, etc. In order to fulfill appearances, they would hang out with those they despised. After all, the girls were husband hunters by trade, and this was the circle that they had to choose from. They just had to do a little digging to get to the diamonds.
If Cooper has any writing defects (and they are few; he's one of my favorites), it's that he will come up with ridiculously unlikely scenarios, here and in other books. Quasi-spoiler here (but not really). Denbingh, the mysterious (creepy?) guy of Emily's dreams runs into to Col. Egerton, not once, but twice in military battle, even saving his life at the battle of Waterloo. What are the odds. Well, slim to none, but again, it's one of Cooper's deficiencies, if you want to call it that (Mark Twain tore him apart in an epic tirade), but this if fiction, and Cooper has a style that will keep you engaged. My guess though is that the Flesch-Kincaid reading level is fairly substantial. Very readable though, but just a caveat for you skimmers.
In the end, we get the impression that everybody lives happily everafter. Then I thought of Denbingh, who was fresh back from a bloody encounter with Napoleon's French Army. Cooper never talks about him again, but such a gruesome experience must have affected him in some way. We can only speculate. At least he had hot Emily to make it better.
I give the book three stars. Very good for a first novel, even given the editing issues. I say this in the context of victorian English novels. If you're into that sort of thing, it's a pretty good book. If not, it'll be just as boring as any of the others, despite the smattering of action Cooper doles out here and there.
August 28, 2017
Combine two parts Jane Austen, one part Brontë sisters, and just a dash of Patrick O'Brian, and you get this, James Fenimore Cooper's debut novel.
It started out pleasant enough, if unremarkable. But as I continued, small bits of especially clever writing would sneak their way into the novel, each time requiring me to set the book aside and spend several minutes savoring the passage I had just read.
Several hundred pages in, the plot seemed nearly to have run its course, and I was starting to wonder whether the story had anywhere left to go, and how the remaining hundred or so pages could possibly be anything other than some very slow wind-down. Instead, the book took delightfully unexpected turn, in both style and content, that had me riveted and unable to put it down for those final hundred pages.
It started out pleasant enough, if unremarkable. But as I continued, small bits of especially clever writing would sneak their way into the novel, each time requiring me to set the book aside and spend several minutes savoring the passage I had just read.
Several hundred pages in, the plot seemed nearly to have run its course, and I was starting to wonder whether the story had anywhere left to go, and how the remaining hundred or so pages could possibly be anything other than some very slow wind-down. Instead, the book took delightfully unexpected turn, in both style and content, that had me riveted and unable to put it down for those final hundred pages.
December 5, 2013
Unlike you, I've actually read this. I remember nothing whatsoever about it, except that I wept with gratitude when I was almost finished.
October 12, 2021
A fantastic opening entry from my newest favorite author, James Fenimore Cooper.
It's in the style of Jane Austen, and I have to admit, I much prefer Cooper. Elizabeth Bennet is, as I said in the relevant review, very snarky and judgmental. But the heroine here, Emily Moseley, is wholly angelic both inwardly and outwardly. Cooper is a devout Christian, and he's not afraid to explicitly put the truths of his faith into the book. The titular message of the novel - that a rigorous Precaution is a crucially important part of choosing a potential husband or wife - is still just as relevant 200 years later.
Notwithstanding his welcome commitment to moralism, Cooper can be pretty funny too. Early on, there's one bit where a minor character named Catherine keeps winning Chess games against similarly aged single men. How? Well, she has very pretty feet, and when playing Chess, she always makes sure to sit so that her opponent has a clear and unobstructed view of said feet. Yes, this is actually in the book.
It's not a perfect book. There's way too many characters - literally about 40 or so. Also, to quote an earlier Austen review of mine, it's one of those books filled "with lots of gossip, rumor, innuendo, misunderstandings, and false impressions." Finally, you could spot some manner of a mistaken identity twist coming a mile away.
I've now read Cooper's penultimate novel, and his very first novel - and with both so excellent, I can't wait to go through the 30 or so in the middle.
It's in the style of Jane Austen, and I have to admit, I much prefer Cooper. Elizabeth Bennet is, as I said in the relevant review, very snarky and judgmental. But the heroine here, Emily Moseley, is wholly angelic both inwardly and outwardly. Cooper is a devout Christian, and he's not afraid to explicitly put the truths of his faith into the book. The titular message of the novel - that a rigorous Precaution is a crucially important part of choosing a potential husband or wife - is still just as relevant 200 years later.
Notwithstanding his welcome commitment to moralism, Cooper can be pretty funny too. Early on, there's one bit where a minor character named Catherine keeps winning Chess games against similarly aged single men. How? Well, she has very pretty feet, and when playing Chess, she always makes sure to sit so that her opponent has a clear and unobstructed view of said feet. Yes, this is actually in the book.
It's not a perfect book. There's way too many characters - literally about 40 or so. Also, to quote an earlier Austen review of mine, it's one of those books filled "with lots of gossip, rumor, innuendo, misunderstandings, and false impressions." Finally, you could spot some manner of a mistaken identity twist coming a mile away.
I've now read Cooper's penultimate novel, and his very first novel - and with both so excellent, I can't wait to go through the 30 or so in the middle.
September 13, 2020
The only positive thing I can say about this book is that I survived reading it - only just. I'm afraid Cooper lost the wager with his wife. His later works, which I read a decade ago, are in a very different style. Leave the domestic dramas to Jane Austen and Maria Edgeworth!
December 17, 2016
One of the greatest American novelists begins his career with a Jane Austen pastiche, and the results are poor. Not to say that there are not moments of good writing here - there are - but it has dated badly and feels about a hundred pages too long. If you want to read Fenimore Cooper, do not start here!
March 29, 2011
This book took place in England, ending around the time of Napolean and the battle of Waterloo.
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews