The image of the veil in Nathaniel Hawthorne's work seems to issue from an uncomfortable psycho-sexual stratum. So the critics say with respect to "The Minister's Black Veil":
We would expect Hooper to display a fastidiousness in his personal relations as well as in his dress. And indeed, the note of tidy womanliness here runs through the tale in a faint, suggestive undercurrent, particularly in the continual mention of the veil. As one parishioner remarks with unconscious acuteness, "How strange . . . that a simple black veil, such as any woman might wear on her bonnet, should become such a terrible thi…