The Minister's Black Veil

A parable is a kind of story, typically a fictional one, that contains a moral or religious principle. This story seems to qualify doubly because it has both. It demonstrates a theme common to...

While Mr. Hooper doesn't explicitly state the reason he wears the veil, he certainly gives a number of clues. He tells Elizabeth, "There is an hour to come . . . when all of us shall cast aside...

The moral lesson of "The Minister's Black Veil" is that we all are sinners. We all have a sin—have made a mistake—that has hurt others, and we all hide our shadow side. As the Reverend Hooper tells...

Because Hawthorne's theme is secret sin, it is likely that he deliberately chooses to not reveal Mr. Hooper's reason(s) for wearing the black veil. The author has, however, borrowed the idea of...

Figurative language makes use of various figures of speech in order to make the writing or speech more effective. Some common figures of speech would be metaphors, similes, allusions, alliteration,...

In "The Minister's Black Veil," the black veil represents isolation for Parson Hooper. He says to Elizabeth, for example, that he is "lonely" and "frightened" as a result of wearing the veil. The...

Yes, the setting of the story is identified in the first line of the text: "The sexton stood in the porch of Milford meeting-house, pulling busily at the bell-rope." Milford is a town in...

In the story, Mr. Hooper's fiance begs him to take off his veil. She states that the veil hides the face that she is always glad to look upon. However, no matter how much she protests at his...

Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Minister's Black Veil" is, like his novel The Scarlet Letter, an expose of the hypocrisy of the Puritans and the destructive power of secret sin. Thus, the action that...

The Puritans, of course, were historically a repressive religious (Protestant) group that left England for the New World in hopes of living a life free of the persecution at the hands of those who...

Initially, Mr. Hooper's veil perturbs his congregation, as people find the black veil to be ominous and foreboding. However, Mr. Hooper's messages seem to be more direct and influential to his...

The veil affects Mr. Hooper's relationship with his congregation because, initially, the sight of him is so shocking. The veil makes his parishioners quite uncomfortable: they doubt it really is...

"The Minister's Black Veil" has puzzled readers and critics since it was published in 1836 because Hawthorne does not make it clear what Reverend Hooper's reasons were for wearing the veil....

In Hawthorne's classic short story, Reverend Hooper wears a black veil, which symbolically represents the various ways presumably righteous citizens conceal their dark secrets and sins. Whenever...

When Mr. Hooper arrives to officiate at the funeral for a young maiden, the mood is already sad and somber. Thus, the "black veil. . . was now an appropriate emblem." It is black, the color of...

Before he donned the black veil, the Reverend Mr. Hooper had been known as a pleasant and popular clergyman but not a particularly effective one. His previous preaching was mild and inoffensive but...

In addition to the dark and gloomy tone pointed out by other commenters, this story is also characterized by an immense sadness. Hawthorne validates Mr. Hooper's belief that each of us hides a...

"The Minister's Black Veil" conveys the idea that we are all sinful by nature, and yet we hide our sinful natures from one another in an attempt to portray ourselves as sinless. In this way, we...

The most important character in "The Minister's Black Veil" is the Reverend Hooper (the minister of the title); his fiance, Elizabeth, also plays into the story significantly as she, in some ways,...

I agree with the previous answer. I do not believe that Mr. Hooper's smile is symbolic of anything. The veil is the predominant symbolic image throughout this story. Mr. Hooper's smile is not an...

Nathaniel Hawthorne was known for his stories based in New England and dealing with Puritan religion. His works of literature have become synonymous with sin and righteousness, and the judgments of...

We never get to find out exactly why Mr. Hooper wears the black veil, which merely adds to its mystery. Nevertheless, there are one or two subtle hints in the text that point towards a possible...

Ordinarily, you'd think that Mr. Hooper's parishioners would want to talk to him about his unusual habit of wearing a black veil all the time. After all, it makes him appear rather odd, and truth...

When Mr. Hooper walks past the sexton, he is amazed; then, as he mounts the pulpit with a black veil, his parishioners are astonished, frightened, unnerved, confused, and appalled. Ironically,...

One further example of external conflict you might like to consider is man v society. In refusing to take off his black veil the minister is pitting himself against his congregation. His stubborn...

The subject of Mr. Hooper's sermon is secret sin—that sin which is hidden from others as well as from oneself. This would seem to be a condition of which Mr. Hooper has direct personal experience:...

One way in which Mr. Hooper benefits from the veil is that he can now affect his parishioners to a much greater extent than he ever did before he put it on. The narrator tells us that, on the day...

In the sin-obsessed atmosphere of the Puritan era, the Reverend Mr. Hooper's black veil, which hides the lower portion of his face and casts doubt in the minds of his congregation that their...

Mr. Hooper’s first sermon in “The Minister’s Black Veil” is about the notion of guilt or “secret sin,” a familiar idea in Hawthorne’s work. Hawthorne establishes this theme early on with the minute...

At the first service, the parishioners are unnerved by the Minister's veil and most feel a sense of dread, something foreboding. The narrator notes that Mr. Hooper's sermons had always been mildly...

Father Hooper addresses the "pale spectators" encircling his death bed with the question "Why do you tremble at me alone?" and the exhortation "Tremble also at each other!" His point is that he...

The narrator in this excellent short story is clear to present events in a detached manner, but there is also a clearly tragic tone added when the veil is referred to. Consider, for example, the...

As narrator of "The Minister's Black Veil," Nathaniel Hawthorne writes, Among all its bad influences, the black veil had the one desirable effect, of making its wearer a very efficient clergyman....

Mr. Hooper has spent his whole life loving other people and never experiencing their love in return. He has always worn the black veil, since the first day he put it on, and this has had the effect...

But there was one person in the village, unappalled by the awe with which the black veil had impressed all beside herself....she, with the calm energy of her character, determined to chase away...

At first, the congregation is "wonder-struck" as the Reverend Mr. Hooper greets them on the way to the pulpit inside the church. In the exposition of "The Minister's Black Veil," the sexton awaits...

Reverend Hooper is characterized directly and indirectly in the story, so it is helpful to understand a definition for each type of characterization. In direct characterization, a narrator makes a...

Reverend Hooper's disturbing black veil is described as an "appropriate emblem" for the funeral that he attends in the afternoon. The somber atmosphere surrounding the black veil corresponds to the...

The main symbol in Hawthorne's short story "The Minister's Black Veil" is Reverend Mr. Hooper's black veil. The ominous black veil symbolically represents the various ways people conceal and hide...

The theme of "The Minister's Black Veil" is that secret sin exists in people, and they are hypocritical about their sins, pretending that they are guileless. This condition is especially true in...

I believe you are referring to Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story, "The Minister's Black Veil." In this story, in addition to Mr. Hooper's veil, another veil is referred to when the narrator...

An allegory is a text in which the characters, events, and so forth all symbolize something in the real world, and its purpose is to convey some moral or theme. It often makes something that is...

The minister of the story, Mr. Hooper, has committed some unspecified sin. We never get to find out what it is, not least because he never tells anyone about it, although there is some speculation...

From the time that he dons the black veil and ascends the pulpit, the congregation of Mr. Hooper becomes unnerved, sensing that "the minister's veil is a fearful secret between him and them."...

Ambiguity in "The Minister's Black Veil" centers around the reasons that the Reverend Mr. Hooper has donned the black veil and why he refuses to remove it, even for his fiancée and, in the end, as...

On his deathbed, Mr. Hooper points out the irony that "men avoided [him], and women show[ed] no pity, and children screamed and fled" from him because of the black veil he wears. It is ironic and,...