James Fenimore Cooper

In one of his lesser known — but still exquisite — books, first published in 1992, David McCullough writes about painter Frederic Remington, an artist who captured the last glimmers of the twilight of the American West of the 19th century, a...

I'm still swamped, so my list today is somewhat truncated. I figured I'd let you guys do the work. My question is: Who are the best duos in historical fiction? I read a lot of the stuff, so I'll offer......

Let's take a moment to acknowledge actor Adam Sandler's significant contribution to American humor. Not that his early work on “Saturday Night Live” or his numerous films have been particularly amusing, but that his movies have inspired some...

"The Count of Monte Cristo," "The Man in the Iron Mask" and "The Corsican Brothers": Who doesn't love a good swashbuckler, complete with flashing swords, romantic couples and all manner of derring-do? Hen's Tooth Video, which specializes in the hard to...

Culture Clash's "Oh, Wild West!" publishes its trilogy of California plays, "Chavez Ravine," "Zorro in Hell!" and "Water & Power," in one volume....

Note: Larry's Daily Mirror posts this year focus on clips from 1920 and 1960, so I will be watching movies from those years and writing about them on alternate weeks. After last week’s post on Roger Corman’s “The Little Shop of Horrors,� Mr....

Could hobbits have originated in Kentucky? Was Aragorn, the heroic ranger in the 20th Century’s most popular English novel, modeled indirectly on Kentucky’s best known frontiersman? It’s possible that these ideas are more than fantasy....

Bolton Landing, N.Y. The Adirondacks, land of long lakes and last Mohicans, do their big business in the summer, when upstate New York gets its meager annual allotment of warm weather. The forest-fringed waterways and low mountains leap to life as...

For the American sailors off Tripoli — five of them from Maryland — it was a suicide mission: Sail the small ship heavy with explosives in among the enemy fleet, set the blast to go off in 15 minutes, jump into lifeboats and get as far away as...

"In the old days we sent Christianity to the savage redskin." - The Herald-Star (Steubenville, Ohio) Nov. 26, 1921 "... and the savage redskin was thirsting for their blood ..." - United States Magazine, June, 1855 "On rushed the savages, flushed with...

The Greater Journey Americans in Paris David McCullough Simon & Schuster: 560 pp., $37.50 For more than 40 years, David McCullough has brought the past to life in books distinguished by vigorous storytelling and vivid characterizations. He garnered...

In the long and often embarrassing history of intellectuals' attempts to grapple with pop culture, there are, at least, a few high points. One of them is the work of the late Leslie Fiedler, the garrulous and provocative critic of literature who could...