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The Minister's Black Veil: A Parable

Nathaniel Hawthorne

First published 1837
Type Short Fiction
Length Short Story

Mr. Hooper the minister begins wearing a black veil over his face for reasons no one knows. It seems to represent some secret sin. His fiancee, finding him too gloomy, breaks off their engagement, but he becomes a very effective preacher.

First published (as by "the author of Sights from a Steeple") in The Token, 1836.
Although this story is not outright supernatural, it is vaguely fantastic, and onlookers in the story believe there to be a sort of ghostly relationship between the minister and a woman who died the day he began wearing the veil.
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Date Publication Publisher Type Page
1837 Cover Twice-Told Tales American Stationers Co. Collection 53
1842 Twice-Told Tales James Munroe Collection |4
1897 Cover Twice-Told Tales Maynard, Merrill, & Co. Collection |2
1907 Cover Twice-Told Tales Houghton Mifflin Collection 52
1909 American The Review of Reviews Co. Anthology 333
1927 American Mystery Stories Oxford University Press, USA Anthology 21
1937 Cover The Complete Novels and Selected Tales of Nathaniel Hawthorne Modern Library Omnibus 872
1941 The Best Known Works of Nathaniel Hawthorne Literary Classics Omnibus 323
1950 Selected Tales and Sketches Rinehart Collection |12
August 1952 50 Great Short Stories Bantam Books Anthology |17
1960 Cover The Minister's Black Veil / Young Goodman Brown Caedmon Collection |1
1962 Cover Hawthorne's Short Stories Dodd, Mead & Co. Collection |3
1963 Cover The Celestial Railroad and Other Stories Signet / New American Library Collection
1964 Classic American Short Stories Barron's Educational Series Anthology 36
1965 Cover Twice-Told Tales Airmont Books Collection 24
1967 Cover Les chefs-d'œuvre du fantastique Planète Anthology 153
1968 Cover The Birthmark and Other Stories Scholastic Book Services Collection
1968 Cover The Birthmark and Other Stories Scholastic Book Services Collection
1970 Cover Selected Tales and Sketches Holt, Rinehart and Winston Collection 183
1973 Cover La vieille fille blanche et autres contes fantastiques Marabout Collection 155
August 1978 Cover 50 Great Short Stories Bantam Books Anthology 404
1982 Cover Tales and Sketches The Library of America Omnibus 371
October 1986 Cover Entre chien et loup: anthologie de la peur Maren Sell Anthology 345
1987 Cover Selected Tales and Sketches Penguin Books (US) Collection 185
April 1989 Cover Anthologie de la peur: Entre chien et loup Seuil Anthology 352
October 1989 Cover Twice-Told Tales Reader's Digest Collection 11
August 1995 Cover Young Goodman Brown and Other Stories Penguin Books Collection 73
September 1998 Cover Haunting Tales Apple / Scholastic Collection 37
May 1999 Cover Dr. Heidegger's Experiment and Other Stories Könemann Collection 147
2001 Cover Twice-Told Tales Modern Library Collection 25
October 2004 Twice-Told Tales Project Gutenberg Collection 33
2005 Cover The Portable Hawthorne Penguin Books (US) Collection 66
2007 Tales and Sketches The Library of America Omnibus |371
October 2008 The Snow-Image and Other Stories of the Supernatural Tartarus Press Collection 83
2010 Cover The Best Horror Short Stories 1800-1849: A Classic Horror Anthology Bottletree Books Anthology
August 2010 Cover Twice-Told Tales Gray Rabbit Publications Collection 25
December 2011 Cover The Collected Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Nathaniel Hawthorne: Volume 3 Leonaur Ltd Collection
December 2011 Cover The Collected Supernatural and Weird Fiction of Nathaniel Hawthorne: Volume 3 Leonaur Ltd Collection
June 2012 Cover Twice-Told Tales ReadHowYouWant Collection 54
August 2012 Cover Short Ghost and Horror Story Collection 17 LibriVox Anthology |14
July 2017 Cover HorrorBabble's Classic Horror: Volume 2 HorrorBabble Anthology |6
September 2017 Cover HorrorBabble's Classic Horror: Volume 2 HorrorBabble Anthology |6
July 2019 Cover American Gothic Short Stories Flame Tree Publishing Anthology