The Possibilities of Parable – the Breath of a Subtle Power: A Reading of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Minister’s Black Veil
The Possibilities of Parable – the Breath of a Subtle Power: A Reading of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Minister’s Black Veil

Summary/Abstract: Through the close reading of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story The Minister’s Black Veil, taking into consideration J. Hillis Miller’s and Michael Colacurcio’s interpretations as well as Paul Ricœur’s explanation of parables, the paper investigates the possibility of interpreting the story – as suggested by the subtitle – as a parable on which a powerful protestant sermon might be based. Remaining within the framework of Calvinist puritan preaching, the workability of such a parable is tested: to what extent it may perform its task of reorientation through disorientation and whether it can be imagined as a means of spreading the Gospel by any – veiled or unveiled – minister.

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