Scribd
Upload
178 views1 page

Example of Short Story Review

Guy de Maupassant's short story "The Necklace" tells the story of Mathilde Loisel, a woman unhappy with her modest social status who borrows a diamond necklace to wear to a ball. She loses the necklace and spends the next 10 years repaying the owner for it with her husband before discovering it was a fake. The story serves as a moral lesson about the dangers of vanity and greed, showing how Mathilde's obsession with wealth and status ultimately ruins her life. It also uses the necklace as a symbol of the emptiness of materialism and chasing after things beyond one's means. Though written in the 19th century, the themes of greed and desire for wealth addressed

Uploaded by

Charlene Kaye Balagso
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
178 views1 page

Example of Short Story Review

Guy de Maupassant's short story "The Necklace" tells the story of Mathilde Loisel, a woman unhappy with her modest social status who borrows a diamond necklace to wear to a ball. She loses the necklace and spends the next 10 years repaying the owner for it with her husband before discovering it was a fake. The story serves as a moral lesson about the dangers of vanity and greed, showing how Mathilde's obsession with wealth and status ultimately ruins her life. It also uses the necklace as a symbol of the emptiness of materialism and chasing after things beyond one's means. Though written in the 19th century, the themes of greed and desire for wealth addressed

Uploaded by

Charlene Kaye Balagso
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 1

The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant

Lessons We Can Learn from “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant

A popular French writer of the 19th century, Guy de Maupassant, is the author of about 300 short stories.
One of the most famous short stories of Maupassant’s is “The Necklace” (“La Parure”). In some editions it has
a title, “The Diamond Necklace”. This story was first published in the French newspaper Le Gaulois on 17th
of February 1884 (Roberts, 1991).
In this short story, Maupassant describes the life of Mathilde Loisel, a young, pretty and charming
woman who lives in dreams of wealth and luxury. Born and raised in a family of clerks, she refuses to accept
her position in life and feels cheated instead. She wants to take a higher social status, that is why her marriage
with a low-paid clerk does not bring happiness to her. She cannot obtain all those wonderful jewels she dreams
about and this fact spoils her life. Even her husband’s love and caring attitude cannot comfort her, because like
a spoiled child, she is blind with her desire and does not notice anything else.
“The Necklace” is deeply didactic: it shows us how people put so much value in materialism,
worshipping expensive items and rich people themselves. It reminds us to avoid Madam Loisel’s fatal
mistakes and focus on the eternal joys of life, such as love, health, and family. We can say that this short story
is similar to a moralistic fable. The length of the work also reminds us of a sapiential Aesop’s Fable. The
example of the protagonist induces us to realize that “hubris” is destructive for our life and we should not try to
be who we are not.
Despite the moral and instructive meaning of the story, it is important to mention that there is no
sermonizing. Readers understand the message of the story on their own. This is typical for most of
Maupassant’s short stories. His characters are often the unhappy victims of their vanity, desire and greed and
the writing style resembles the style of Gustave Flaubert due to its clarity, simplicity and objective calmness
(The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed., 2012).
The title of the story is not accidental. The necklace is a symbol of envy and greed which are the leading
themes of the story. It owns a central role in the story of vanity and two ruined human lifes, put on the altar of
material objects. The necklace represents that deceiving other people will inevitably lead to one’s downfall.
Also, in a symbolical way, it shows how greed can change a human’s soul. We can compare the necklace with
the protaginist herself – someone who has a strong desire to have an expensive look, but in reality, it was fake.
This work could become a true Cinderella story with the traditional happy ending. Its main heroine could
be rescued and given a rightful place in society. But as we see, Maupassant decided to write a story that could
happen in our everyday life, not a tale. That is why he portrayed Mathilde as a prideful woman, obsessed with
the idea of getting rich. She wanted other woman to envy her and was ready to do everything to get jewels and
life punished her for this.
Even though “The Necklace was written in the 19th century, it is worth reading today, as such themes as
greed and desire for fast enrichment remain relevant. This short story is written in a simple and clear way, but
its meaning is deep without a doubt. It teaches us to be thankful for everything we have and remember that
greed leads to deplorable results.

References
Edgar Roberts: Writing Themes About Literature (7th ed.). Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1991. – p. 4.
Maupassant, Guy de.” The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed., 2012. Retrieved 13 May, 2013.
The Tales of Maupassant. New York: Heritage Press. 1964.

You might also like