The Necklace

Chidiebube Nwadiogbu

English 1100
September 17th, 2017
Prof. Young

The Necklace

How do you determine someone's class? Is it through the type of cars that they have? The amount of money? Their clothing? other luxurious property that they own? These are questions that we all ask ourselves whenever we judge individuals based on class. No matter what people may believe, judging someone based on their looks is human instinct. Although judging is natural, it has it's negative consequences because we often form prejudice and stereotypes to compensate for our judgement. Guy de Maupassant exposes this fault in his story, "The Necklace". The main character, Mathilde, goes through the conflict of not fitting in with her designated class. She feels entitled to be part of the upper class and to dress up like the rich and she resents the fact that she's born into a poor class. Through out the plot of the story, she goes through many more conflicts regarding her determination to be part of the upper class, such as picking the right clothing or jewelry. In the story, "The Necklace", the right thing to do is to be grateful for what one has in life because one may never know when they are going to lose it 

Mathilde best represents a character that embodied greed. She was never satisfied over what she had and she coveted properties of the rich. The narrator introduces Mathilde in a way that tells the reader that she is "superior" to others around her and that she does not fit in with her class. The narrator greatly emphasizes on her looks and describes her as too pretty and charming to even stand among the commoners. In the earlier part of the story, the narrator explains her life as a "suffering" by describing how "she suffered from the poverty of her dwelling, from the wretched look of the walls, from the worn out chairs, from the ugliness of the curtains" (Maupassant 49). With the way the narrator describes her environment, you would have thought she grew up as a homeless lady. Mathilde's lack of gratitude, blocks out the positive things in her life and only focuses on the negative things. Although her property may not be the best of the best, at least she has something. Mathilde's greed therefore led to her downfall in the story. 

Mathilde's downfall came at the climax of the story which was when she lost the necklace that she borrowed from her rich friend. She borrowed the necklace because she felt that she was not complete without it. She believed that without a jewel, she wouldn't fully assimilate with the upper class. In this case the necklace was a symbol for richness. The narrator even described the jewel as a "treasure" when she put it on her neck. The loss of the necklace was very ironic. Mathilde and Loisel (her husband) did not even notice it was missing until she got home. Maupassant's goal for that was to show the lack of importance the necklace really had. Surely if it was as important as Mathilde emphasized it to be, she would have felt it when it was no longer on her neck because people would "detect" her real class. This lack of importance placed on the necklace showed that Mathilde did not really need it in order to stand out in the group. If Mathilde would have been grateful in at least having a new dress, she wouldn't have been so desperate to borrow jewelry from her friend. 

After Mathilde tried to replace Madame Forestier's (her friend) necklace, she ends up putting herself and her husband into bankruptcy. Her and her husband paid an enormous amount of money in order to get a necklace similar to the one that they lost. "Madame Loisel now knew the horrible existence of the needy. She took her part moreover, all of a sudden, with heroism" (Maupassant 52). When the Loisel family entered into debt, Mathilde now knew what true poverty was. No longer was she in a house that she described as "wretched", now she had to work ten times harder and live in a real wretched area in order to pay off her debt. Mathilde proves to be a dynamic character here because she finally accepted her work and did it with all her might because she realized her state and the importance of getting as much money as possible. This change in her spirit can be seen as the lesson learned from the story. She learned that her previous state was not as bad as she made it out to be. Therefore, her landing in debt was actually good for her character. 

Overall, the right thing in this story was to be grateful for what you have. Ungratefulness can usually lead to a loss that's going to lead to a way worse situation than before. Humility and gratefulness can go a long way in making one have a happy life.