“The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant is a wonderful short story that takes place in a time when women were viewed only useful for chores and being a trophy wife. In this story, the main character, Mathilde Loisel is the wife of Monsieur Loisel. She is so hungry to be a part of the rich group and that of the upper class in the economy. Every day, she dreams more and more to go to balls and dance with rich people rather than spend time with her husband. She is a very bitter person, and seems to only care about herself throughout the story. Her husband is a very nice and caring individual. He proves that to us as readers, when he walks back into his home with an invitation that is very difficult to get to a ball with only select upper class. Instead of her reacting in a happy and positive way, she tells him that it’s a pointless invitation because the good dress she wears to the movies isn’t good enough to wear to this party. He gives her the money that he has been saving up for a gun for himself, that will also be beneficial for his family, so she can buy a dress. The main character in this story is very unlikable, but it’s definitely a great way to drive the story forward. It keeps the reader’s emotions open and available throughout the entire story. Even though this character is very disrespectful and annoying, it keeps our attention throughout the story.
After the main character buys an expensive dress, she gets sad and again manipulates her husband. She tells him that she doesn’t have any good jewelry for the ball and so she won’t go. He tells her to go see her rich friend, Madame Forestier for some jewelry to borrow. After she goes, she picks out a nice necklace to borrow. She then goes to the ball and has a great time. She loses the necklace, not being able to find it at all. Her husband and her end up working for around ten years to try to pay off the expensive amount it would have costed. They went from being upper middle-class to poor all because of the main character’s very selfish decision. After they pay everything, we get to see inside of her mind again, and she is still focused on being upper class. After we get that really cool image, she meets her old rich friend, Forestier. It turns out that the necklace that Mathilde lost was just a fake the entire time, they bought Forestier an actual diamond necklace. Loisel never thought to tell the truth, all she did was lie and think about ways to cover up her tracks and opinions about her in the eyes of Forestier.
I think that this story is a really great way to show people that you don’t need to lie to people. Honesty is a good way to just deal with the situation at hand. Lying will just dig you a deeper hole.
