How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
"Now Major Heyward speaks as Major Heyward should," said Cora; "who that looks at this creature of nature, remembers the shade of his skin?"
A short and apparently an embarrassed silence succeeded this remark, which was interrupted by the scout calling to them, aloud, to enter. (6.6 -6.7)
Awkward! Cora says that it's possible to be blind to race (especially when you're looking at someone who is awesome and/or hawt). The rest of the group acts as though she's just burped her way through the ABCs at a fancy dinner party.
Quote #5
But Uncas, denying his habits, we had almost said his nature, flew with instinctive delicacy, accompanied by Heyward, to the assistance of the females, and quickly releasing Alice, placed her in the arms of Cora. (12.13)
Here Native Americans are shown to have a compulsion to scalp their enemies, and Uncas is celebrated for being able to resist this compulsion. This is super-backwards and buys into the idiotic and harmful stereotype that all Native Americans are hyper-violent and bloodthirsty.
Quote #6
There it was my lot to form a connection with one who in time became my wife, and the mother of Cora. She was the daughter of a gentleman of those isles, by a lady whose misfortune it was, if you will," said the old man, proudly, "to be descended, remotely, from that unfortunate class who are so basely enslaved to administer to the wants of a luxurious people." (16.27)
How do you interpret this admission of Cora's African-American heritage? Why does Munro feel the need to be so oblique about it? And how does this play into the formation of Cora's character?