The Minister's Black Veil

The Minister's Black Veil: A Parable is a short story by American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne. There are several translations into German before: The Black Veil ( as translated by Friedrich Minckwitz, 1970 and Lore Kruger, 1979) and The priest's black veil ( Hannelore Neves, 1977).

It was published anonymously in 1836 in the literary almanac The Token and Atlantic Souvenir, 1837, she took on Hawthorne in his short story collection Twice - Told Tales.

Content

Pastor Hooper appears one day with veiled face in front of his horrified congregation. Even when his fiancee leaves him, he does not break with the self-imposed intent until his death no longer remove the veil. Although most of the villagers ( and when viewed in the mirror of themselves), through his disguise rather scared, he acquired through his peculiar cladding on the other hand power over " all the souls that writhe in the consciousness of their sins " (By the aid of his mysterious emblem -for there what no other apparent cause- he Became a man of awful power over souls thatwere in agony for sin).

Symbol and Interpretation

The clear view of the short story dominant symbol of the veil has been widely interpreted as a form of sin: " Hoopers obtained by the discrepancy between the self-image of the clergy and its effect on the environment, an ironic tension through the veil symbolized sin consciousness." The veil drives pastor Hooper finally in a caused by religion loneliness and alienation ( in a somewhat different form, certainly in the short story Young Goodman Brown ( The young neighbor Brown) is encountered ):

Many interpretations emphasize the negative rating of at Hawthorne often themed role of sin ( and especially original sin ) in the Puritan theology.