Comparing and Contrasting the Protagonists in Flannery O’Connor’s Good Country People and Hawthorne's The Minister’s Black Veil

Father Hooper, a character in The Ministers Black Veil, has put a wall up between himself and his parishioners with the simple adornment of a veil. The veil is symbolic of secret and sin the Father is trying to hide from the world. A secret so massive, it is not even to be removed by his Fiancee’, Elizabeth. While he, himself will not let his secrets be known until his earthly departure, it can be presumed that they carry the weight of infidelity. On his deathbed, Father Hooper described seeing a black veil on everyone he has met, perceiving that everyone has their own walls and

Whatever his reason for his odd clothing, Reverend Hooper's veil caused more than a physical separation from the people of his town. The people felt the veil was "the symbol of a fearful secret between him and them" (Hawthorne 256). Their fear and confusion of the minister's motives caused strange behavior and unnatural withdrawal from their spiritual leader.

In the short story The Minister's Black Veil Nathaniel Hawthorne is explaining how mankind is afflicted by the seven sins. The officer of the church is ring the town bell calling all the people of the village to church, when the church sexton sees Mr. Hooper leave his house he stops ring the bell. The people of the town don't like the Hoopers change in appearance they think that he has lost his sanity and no one walks on the side of the street he lives on. Later in the story the their is a funeral for a young woman and the town people think that's why Hooper is wearing the Black veil “for his own secret sins”. The young minister asks Hooper to remove the veil as Hooper is dying. Hooper is brought to his grave, “Many years pass, and grass

His fiancée Elizabeth initially tries to reason with Hooper, hoping that she can get through to him. Or that he will at least remove the veil for her. Instead, he gives her vague answers and confirms that he will never take off the veil. Finally, the creepiness begins to affect Elizabeth and she leaves him. This is definitely symbolic of the consequences of sin. Parsons Hooper refuses honesty even to his own fiancée and in return, he loses her. She asks him to at least explain why he cannot remove it, but he doesn’t give an answer instead he says “Know, then, this veil is a type and a symbol, and I am bound to wear it ever, both in light and darkness, in solitude and before the gaze of multitudes,

"The Minister's Black Veil," does not have just one, but many meanings. The first and most obivious moral is that everyone sins, no one is perfect. The second moral is that you should not focus too much on other's sins, it can distract you from yourself and also if you focus to much on others sins you could build a "barrier" between you and them and miss out on a life full of friendship and community, as the parson did by wearing his black veil. The contextual evidence helped me determine how the towns people actually felt about the veil and Parson Hooper after he began wearing the veil. This helped me determine what the veil represented to the town's people and how it caused them to turn away from him when they saw it because, I believe,

“The Minister’s Black Veil” is a parable that is cloaked in ambiguity. I believe that the author wrote this parable with a purpose. Like a piece of art, the story’s mystery allows each reader to interpret it differently. This however, results in many different inferences. As I read, and reread, the story I was convinced that the veil represents the dangers of judgment.

The well-known American novelist in the Dark Romantic era, Nathaniel Hawthorne, wrote and published the short story, “The Minister’s Black Veil”, in 1836. Reverend Hooper lives in the small New England town of Milford. One Sabbath morning, Reverend Hooper delivers a sermon while wearing a black veil. In the short story “The Minister’s Black Veil” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Mr. Hooper’s relationship with his community is affected in a negative way because the veil distances him from his congregation. For instance, while giving the sermon the community was affected causing a commotion “ such was the effect of this simple piece of crape, that more than one woman of the delicate nerves was forced to leave the meetinghouse” (lines 69-70). This demonstrates

In addition, the Minister’s wore the black veil to show that he’s done something sinful but it’s too sacred for anyone to know. As it explains in article 3, it says that “people can’t hide from their sins, overtime sins will build up ruining their souls” and that’s what Mr. Hooper was explaining by wearing the black veil.

In this essay, it discusses about ¨The Ministerś Black Veil" which is a short story about a reverend that goes by the name of, Mr. Hooper. In this short story, Mr. Hooper starts wearing a black veil, to cover his face. "There was but one thing remarkable in his appearance. Swathed about his forehead, and hanging over his face, so low as to be shaken by his breath, Mr. Hooper had on a black veil." (page 2). People in the town start to gossip about him because he decided to wear the black veil daily. It started one sabbath morning when he showed up with it to church. Mr. Hooper refuses to tell anyone why he wears the black veil. The black veil has its own symbolism, but it also means separation. The first separation is from the people, which

To the townspeople, Hooper's black veil is a clear sign that he is trying to atone for a grave sin someone has done in the past. One of the symbols of the black veil is to show that someone has committed a sin in their life in the past. "The Minister's Black Veil" is that those who acknowledge the secrets of their hearts and those who choose to stand apart from their fellows will often find that they are ostracized and may well lead lives of loneliness, prisoners in their own hearts. In "The Minister's Black Veil," Mr. Hooper kindles the townspeople when he starts wearing a mysterious black veil. He refuses to tell anyone why he's wearing it, and the townsfolk begin to think less of his character because of it. In the end, he dies without anyone knowing his reasoning for wearing the black veil. Over time the townsfolk isolated Mr. Hooper because he didn't want to tell them his reason for wearing a

Contrastingly enough, Father Hooper perceives sin through real experiences. "The Minister 's Black Veil" begins with Hooper exiting his home and walking to church to preach the Sunday morning sermon. People cry out in astonishment, question his identity, forget to greet him, move about uncomfortably, and whisper upon seeing a black veil over his face (Hawthorne 1311-12). Hooper 's fiancée Elizabeth informs him of rumors spreading throughout the town and asks him to remove the veil, but he refuses to do so. Hooper responds, "If I cover it for secret sin, what mortal might not do the same?" (Hawthorne 1317). Edgar Allan Poe concurs with the idea of a secret sin in his criticism of Hawthorne 's work. Poe attributes the veil to a need to hide remorse for a crime related to a young woman whose funeral Hooper

We take a trip back to the lovely Puritan era to understand the content matter of Hawthorne’s The Minister’s Black Veil. In this tale, Reverend Hooper, a young, unassuming, and unremarkable minister in everyway, suddenly dons a black veil, to the shock and mystery of the small town he preaches in. He becomes a pariah with his insistence to remove it, and loses his following and even his fiancee. He insists even on his deathbed to keep the veil into the grave.

The Ministers Black Veil”, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. In the text Mr. Hooper is a preacher who is engaged to Elizabeth and has recently started hiding his face behind a black veil. The townspeople begin to think he’s gone mad. He is very loving and caring, but known as living his life without much worries and being a sinful man. While wearing the veil, he preaches and then is buried in it. Before he dies the only person who is not afraid to question Mr. Hooper about the veil is his fiancé. He does not give Elizabeth a clear answer to wearing the veil, which forces Elizabeth to believe he’s covering up a committed sin by wearing the veil. Throughout Hawthorne’s work there were different actions that his characters portray. These characters are identified as puritans who fought inner demons between lies and their sanity.

In the end, the extremely ill minister confirms the significance of the black veil. This veil is undoubtedly meant to demonstrate or represent the judgmental qualities of the villagers. Although both are quite different, the villager’s version of the veil’s purpose and Mr. Hooper’ s version actually have a related bond. The villagers believe that the minister is only using the black veil to indiscreetly hide behind a secret sin that he has committed. However, the purpose that they have in mind is based solely on assumptions due to the fact that they do not have factual evidence to back up their claim. The minister’s purpose for wearing the veil was in fact to teach those in his parish that they should set aside their judgments and accept others rather than assuming barbaric ideas. Both versions are related, because what the minister is tying to teach tem not to do, is exactly what they go on to

If we take “The Minister’s Black Veil” as a horror story, it leads us to certain conclusions about the nature of the veil and Hooper’s refusal to take it off. If horror is something that centers upon the horrifying or macabre, especially concerning the supernatural, one can see that this story could belong. Hooper never divulges the exact nature of the veil, and we are left to speculate about what it could possibly mean. Several possibilities present themselves if we think of this story as a horror story; it could be that the veil is covering Hooper’s face to be a constant reminder to his congregation and all who see him of secret sin. It seems that the idea that he could possibly know someone’s secret sin is terrifying to the townspeople. Indeed, this veil does give Hooper “awful power over souls that were in agony for sin” (943). Sinners fear him, because they feel that the black veil is a reference to their own personal secret sins. And the veil gives him an association with the dead and ghostly qualities; after the girl’s funeral at the beginning of the story, one woman remarks that she thought she saw Hooper walking hand in hand with the ghost of the dead girl. Such things would not have been imagined if he had never donned the veil.