“The Minister’s Black Veil” is a masterly composition of in which the sole defect is that to the rabble its exquisite skill will be caviare. The obvious meaning of this article will be found to smother its insinuated one. The moral put into the mouth of the dying minister will be supposed to convey the true import of the narrative; and that a crime of dark dye, (having reference to the “young lady”) has been committed, is a point which only minds congenial with that of the author will perceive.
Based on your interpretation of the story, do you agree with Poe's reading? Why (not)?
6 comments:
Discordo da interpretação de Poe. Não penso que o véu negro seja um símbolo da alma maculada, mas sim da alma velada. Isto é evidenciado pelas suas palavras no funeral da "young maiden": " he prayed that they, and himself, (...) might be ready (...) for the dreadful hour that should snatch the veil from their faces.". O véu é "arrancado" da cara dos paroquianos no momento da sua morte porque é esse o momento do juízo dos seus pecados por Deus. Sendo omnisciente, Deus vê tudo o que o Homem pensa, e todos os pecados que comete nos seus pensamentos. O Homem, não sendo divino, é muitas vezes incapaz de ver para além dos "véus" utilizados por aqueles que rodeiam, tal como os que o rodeiam têm dificuldade em ver aquilo que o véu dele oculta. Hawthorne não utilizaria o verbo "to snatch" se o véu simbolizasse uma alma maculada/pecaminosa. Faz, sim, sentido utilizar este verbo significando o véu a máscara que esconde os pecados do homem.
Para além disso, uma personagem como Mr. Hooper, que é descrita como sendo "of such blameless example, holy in deed and thought", e que o confirma pela sua dedicação à utilização deste véu, não imploraria à sua mulher que ficasse junto dele ("Have patience with me, Elizabeth! Do not desert me. (...) Do not leave me in this miserable obscurity for ever!", pag.2221) sabendo que tinha contra ela um crime considerado tão hediondo (o adultério). Penso que, caso a utilização deste véu tivesse sido motivada pela vergonha de ter cometido adultério, então para além de envergar o véu para o resto da vida, Mr. Hooper teria aceite ser abandonado pela mulher como um castigo adequado ao seu crime.
É também relevante notar que, ao envergar um véu negro durante o seu sermão, Mr. Hooper potencia a sua capacidade retórica ("making its wearer a very efficient clergyman", pag.2222)ao se transformar numa não-entidade ("almost believing that a stranger's visage would be discovered, though the form, gesture, and voice were those of Mr. Hooper", pag.2218; "makes him ghost-like", pag.2218) que é ao mesmo a consciência de todos os paroquianos ("and I would not be alone with him for the world. I wonder if he is not afraid to be alone with himself!", pag.2218) e um espelho para as suas acções e modos de ser ("Tremble also at each other! (...) On every visage a Black Veil!", pag.2224), daí que tanto perturbe os membros da sua paróquia.
I mostly agree with Poe’s statement. At the beginning, Mr. Hooper is described “pacing slowly his meditative way”, “a gentlemanly person”, “nodding kindly to those of his parishioners”, “Mr. Hooper had the reputation of a good preacher, but not an energetic one” and nothing tells the reader that he is capable of a horrendous action. Besides that, it seems to be a small village, everyone knows each other. How could he have done something awful without everyone knowing? And being a clergyman (and not for example a farmer that owned some tools and had some isolated barn) how could he have killed someone? And where, since he was always in public spaces or in people’s houses? The point of focus is also not in him (and it is usually on the sinner) but in the village people, who react to the black veil.
However, there are some hints of a hidden sin. These hints are in Mr. Hooper’s first service where he talks about “secret sin”, after the service when people comment on the black veil: “Something must surely be amiss with Mr. Hooper’s intellects (…) makes him ghostlike”, at the young lady’s funeral where she would be the only one to see his face, in the wedding: “and her deathlike paleness caused a whisper that the maiden who had been buried a few hours before was come from her grave to be married.”, the comment after the funeral: “the minister and the maiden’s spirit were walking hand in hand.” Elizabeth expresses the meaning of the black veil when she asks: ‘“What grievous affliction hath befallen you,” she earnestly inquired, “that you should thus darken your eyes forever?”’ After that point, it is a fact that Mr. Hooper “conscience tortured him for some great crime too horrible” and the story’s characters know that the veil is hiding a “horrible crime”.
KANSU EKİN TANCA
In the short story “The Minister’s Black Veil”, the very first introductory lines do not totally imply a story which would have a moral in the end. However, I agree with Poe, because I also think that Hawthorne was creating the story in a way that a final truth would come up in the end. Hawthorne is deliberately describing the scenes and he is continually giving voices to different characters throughout the play. In a way, the reader is invited to observe the different as well as the similar attitudes towards the same “Black Veil.” The reader is eventually comparing his own attitude while reading the narrative, and he also wonders what would happen. Therefore, by developing his main moral within the text, Hawthorne achieves “to convey the true import of the narrative” in the end – as Poe has suggested. Even if it is clear for us, it is interesting to see that it is unfortunately not visible for the rest of the characters in the story. This fact also expands the moral lesson and the story ends with a striking sentence. “.. Mr. Hooper’s face is dust; but awful is still the thought, that it mouldered beneath the Black Veil!”(p.2224). In this sense, I found Poe’s following comment similar to mine, where he says “the moral put into the mouth of the dying minister” as the readers can only learn the reasons for wearing the black veil on Mr. Hooper’s deathbed which only happens in the last few paragraphs. When he finally says “I look around me, and lo! on every visage a Black Veil!” he reveals what he thinks about the “secret sins” and morality.(p.2224) In addition to this, the possible emphasis on writing the words “Black Veil” with capital letters may also suggest that this black veil is now a concept rather than being 'a piece of cloth'. Thus, it can also imply that the short story’s main intention is to discover what this ‘mysterious symbol’ really means and what Mr. Hooper is trying to teach with that “simple piece of crape.” (p.2217).
What I get from Poe's words, is that the "we-all-have-things-to-hide" morale isn't the whole point of the story. Poe alludes to something the minister and the writer don't tell us. To Poe, it's like Hawthorne is making fun of us, making us wait til the end just to find out the morale has been obvious from the start; maybe that's why Poe thinks there must be something more, something hidden.
I don't know if I agree or not. Of course the story tells us something; however, I feel like Poe's words made me think more than the story itself. He adds this sense of mystery that, on a first reading, I wouldn't have found.
Concordo com o que Poe escreveu no sentido em que as últimas palavras de Hooper falam da incongruência que foi a atitude das pessoas em relação a ele ("...children screamed and fled...") (pg2224), só porque usava um véu negro, quando todos usam, na verdade, um véu negro ("...I look around me...on every visage a black veil!") (pg.2224) e, na minha opinião, essa é a verdadeira mensagem do conto, uma vez que Hawthorne confronta as suas personagens veladas com a materialização do véu e estas não o aceitam ("...He has changed himself into something awful, only by hiding his face..."(pg.2217). Para além disso, parece-me que Poe faz um trocadilho entre "dye" tingir e "die" morre, dizendo que a interpretação de que "a crime of dark dye" foi cometido só será apoiada por aqueles que estiverem de acordo com o autor. Também estou de acordo com isto uma vez que, ao ler o conto, me pareceu que Hawthorne se esforça para descrever uma personagem de valores que é, invariavelmente, incompreendida pelos seus pares, chegando até a criar no leitor um sentimento de pena em relação a Hooper, tendo em conta que este é vítima do tingimento do véu (...Something must surly be amiss with Mr. Hooper's intellects") (pg.2218), de tal forma que acaba por morrer isolado (...All through life that piece of crape had hung between him and the world..."(pg.2223), daí a menção a um crime por parte de Poe: as pessoas afastaram cruelmente Hooper, cometendo, assim, um crime que o levou a uma "dark death". No entanto, como afirma Poe, é necessário que se esteja em sintonia com o autor para esta interpretação, já que outros poderão pensar que o medo e consequente afastamento da população é não só justificado como derivado do comportamento de Hooper, sendo que nesse caso, nenhum crime terá sido cometido
The obvious moral is revealed in the last dying breath of the Minister: every men wear black veils in order to hide (" I look around me, and, lo! on every visage a Black Veil!") their sins from their countrymen and neighbours. One hides the shame and guilt of one's peers. The difference between every other men and Mr. Hooper is that the latter chose to wear his Black Veil in public, in a phisycal and symbolic manner.
This is the clear moral: one is ostracized and despised if shows an ugly truth to mankind.
But I tend to agree with Poe in the existence of a more powerful and dark teaching. The idea that one should not do such a thing. Hawthorne presents that wearing symbols that reveal the truth will cut one out of society as a fact, a law of nature. Yet, the frequent use of the word "strange" and the constant rumours and protagonist's attitudes (the stuborness, the lost of everyone who cared, the fear he installed in everyone) are not consequences, but warnings. The author gives a little preview of what the minister was before he started wearing the black veil (gentlemen-like, likeable, loved, a good presence), after he started wearing it all this crumbled, people started having strange, dark feelings and fancies about Mr. Hooper ("I had a fancy," replied she," that the minister and the maiden's spirit were walking hand in hand").
Nawthorne's parable rely on this subject: one should stay quiet about general problems, if one denounces or bluntly presents them it only backfires, and society does not learn anything from such behaviour.
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