FINAL PAPER
ENGLISH PROSE
THE MINISTER’S
BLACK VEIL BY
NATHANIEL
HAWTHORNE
AZIZATUR RAHMA
1214025017
ENGLISH
LITERATURE
CULTURAL STUDIES
FACULTY
2013
I choose The Minister’s black veil because it
is quiet interesting. This story has a good moral value, and the plot which
story about Mr. Hooper’s life as a minister a parson. This story is
unpredictable, we can learn how people express their self. The differences
which was shown in this story was how the main character solved his problem.
Took a hard decision to made everyone were aware.
I ever had read several short story, most of
them told about love, horor or mystery. But this story told me a ‘new’ type. I
read how the story could open my mind with a unique quotation
"Why do you tremble at me alone?"
cried he, turning his veiled face round the circle of pale spectators.
"Tremble also at each other! Have men avoided me, and women shown no pity,
and children screamed and fled, only for my black veil? What, but the mystery
which it obscurely typifies, has made this piece of crape so awful? When the
friend shows his inmost heart to his friend; the lover to his best beloved;
when man does not vainly shrink from the eye of his Creator, loathsomely
treasuring up the secret of his sin; then deem me a monster, for the symbol
beneath which I have lived, and die! I look around me, and, lo! on every visage
a Black Veil!" (Hawthorne:12)
The Minister’s Black veil was a short story
which told about Mr. Hooper as a parson in the Milford village, who wore a
strange stuff on his face. He came to the meeting-house wore a black veil, cover his face. The congregation
shocked with Mr. Hooper’s vagary. They asked to each other why did the minister
wear a black veil. Several people did not like it. They thought Mr. Hooper
getting mad. But Mr. Hooper enter the meeting-house without feel perturbation.
Some gathered in little circles, huddled closely together, with their mouths
all whispering in the centre; some went homeward alone, wrap in silent
meditation; some talked loudly, and profaned the Sabbath day with ostentatious
laughter.
The afternoon service, there is a funeral of
young lady. The people talked, about Mr. Hooper who still wear a black veil.
But in this funeral, his black veil was appropriate. From the coffin, Mr.
Hooper passed the chamber of mourners thence make funeral prayers.
In the night, a couple in that village got
married. They invite Mr. Hooper to their party. But, at the first time they
looked back, in the party, he still wore his black veil, which had deeper gloom
to the funeral. After performing the ceremony, Mr. Hooper raised a glass of
wine to his lips, wishing happiness to the new-married couple in a strain of
mild pleasantry that ought to have brightened the features of the guests, like a
cheerful gleam from the hearth.
The next day, whole village of Milford talked
about Mr. Hooper’s black veil. They talked the mystery behind black veil. Good
women gossiping his black veil frankly, they thought Mr. Hooper hid a big sin.
Nobody was brave enough to talked directly to
Mr. Hooper. Just one person, who brave, Elizabeth. His fiancé tried to ask Mr.
Hooper to take off his black veil. but, Mr. Hooper did not take off his black
veil. He asked his fiancé to receive his decision to put it on. Thus, Elizabeth
left Mr. Hooper.
Everybody avoided Mr. Hooper, they only
invited Mr. Hooper when they were sick, or there was a funeral. They did not
invite Mr. Hooper to the party, or a happy agenda. Finally, Mr. Hooper was
dying. There was another parson, Reverend Clark, he tried to ask Mr. Hooper
took of his black veil again, but she failed. Mr. Hooper still did not want. He
said that "Why do you tremble at me alone?" cried he, turning his
veiled face round the circle of pale spectators. "Tremble also at each
other! Have men avoided me, and women shown no pity, and children screamed and
fled, only for my black veil? What, but the mystery which it obscurely
typifies, has made this piece of crape so awful? When the friend shows his
inmost heart to his friend; the lover to his best beloved; when man does not
vainly shrink from the eye of his Creator, loathsomely treasuring up the secret
of his sin; then deem me a monster, for the symbol beneath which I have lived,
and die! I look around me, and, lo! on every visage a Black Veil!"
After that, every people was aware. The symbol
got change. Another parson, Mr. Joseph Moody came and wore a black veil. But
unfortunately, this parson hid his big sin behind his black veil, because he
killed his best friend.
There were four characters in this short
story, Mr. Hooper, Elizabeth, Mr. Clark and society. Mr. Hooper as a parson and
Elizabeth was his fiancé. He was a good man, and had flat character. From the
first story, the author introduce Mr. Hooper as a good parson.
Mr. Hooper had the reputation of a good
preacher, but not an energetic one: he strove to win his people heavenward by
mild, persuasive influences, rather than to drive them thither by the thunders
of the Word. The sermon which he now delivered was marked by the same
characteristics of style and manner as the general series of his pulpit
oratory.(Hawthorne, 3)
We can see in the first story, the author
described the main character as a good person even though, the society
gossiping him. But until the end, Mr. Hooper still become a good character.
He was a stolid person, he was insensitive,
never thought about people’s mind. we can see it in each paragraph which
explain how the society had a bad argument for Mr. Hooper, because he wore a
black veil. But, even though the society said that he got mad or hid the big
sin. He still wore the black veil until the end of his life. Because he believed
with what he did. The proof was looked since at the first story, which told
about Mr. Hooper who still nodding kindly towards his parishioners.
“With this gloomy shade before him, good Mr.
Hooper walked onward, at a slow and quiet pace, stooping somewhat, and looking
on the ground, as is customary with abstracted men, yet nodding kindly to those
of his parishioners who still waited on the meeting-house steps.” (Hawthorne,
2)
Mr. Hooper
had a different method to think with his parishioners. He thought carefully, he
wanted other people to know what he meant without he notified directly.
Unfortunately, whole parishioners did not know what did he think. There was a
proof in the end of this story, when whole people was shocked by Mr. Hooper’s
words. He told them the reason why he wore his black veil and never took it off
in the end of his life.
“While his auditors shrank from one another,
in mutual affright, Father Hooper fell back upon his pillow, a veiled corpse,
with a faint smile lingering on the lips.” (Hawthorne, 11)
Mr. Hooper
was a neat person. He always kept his appearance. He also was a calm person.
“Mr. Hooper, a gentlemanly person, of about thirty,
though still a bachelor, was dressed with due clerical neatness, as if a
careful wife had starched his band, and brushed the weekly dust from his
Sunday's garb. There was but one thing remarkable in his appearance.”
(Hawthorne, 2)
