The Minister's Black Veil

The purpose of this research is to examine Nathaniel Hawthorne's nineteenth-century short story "The Minister's Black Veil" from a historical perspective. The plan of the research will be to set forth evidence showing that the story is in significant part a reflection of Hawthorne's understanding of and reaction to early American social history, particularly his philosophical judgment of Puritan Massachusetts Bay.

"The Minister's Black Veil" portrays what Becker terms "the Puritan spirit" (94) in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, inasmuch as it illustrates the confluence of secular and religious life in Boston. Yet whereas Becker identifies the vitality of eighteenth century Boston with the residue of the positive qualities of the Puritan ethic, he is careful to note that in the seventeenth century, which is the period of the story, the prevailing form of government was that of theocracy rather than Puritan democracy. Further, the attitude of the theocratic culture was something like self-righteous on one hand, and, on the other hand, prone to suspect that the worldly misfortunes of people reflected God's spiritual displeasure with them and their sinfulness (Schorer, et al., 114-6). To be sure, Becker notes the ultimately selfdefeating nature of theocratic rigidity, stating that "the history of Massachusetts Bay in the seventeenth century is the story of the vain and pathetic effort of single-minded men to identify the temporal and the spiritual commonwealths" (97). In su

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f-imposed vow of moral silence gives rise to "ambiguity of sin or sorrow, which enveloped the poor minister, so that love or sympathy could never reach him. It was said that ghost and fiend consorted with him there . . . Even the lawless wind, it was believed, respected his dreadful secret, and never blew aside the veil" (Hawthorne, 300-1). Mr. Hooper's isolation is moral and nonetheless, or for that very reason, socially uncomfortable. At one level he may be said to cloak himself in his collar, yet his torment and isolation are greater because he represents public morality and will not disclose to the public whatever transgression--real or imagined by him--occasioned his "taking the veil" as one might "take the collar." In Mr. Hooper's whole persona there seems a critique against the hypocrisy that the social aspect of private morality breeds, but there exists a dimension apart from the social one, the spiritual. Personal morality can punish far more potently than the more "ordinary" (at least in Puritan society) a public social opprobrium. The background for this complex symbolism for socialhistorical criticism may be seen in Hawthorne's personal background. Bakusci cites Hawthorne's years of research into Puritan New En

Category: Literature - T