In human life, we are faced with many difficulties regarding decisions and choices. Often, these choices and pressures bring out the less than desirable in the human soul, where we sometimes believe we have no other choice than to lie. An example of two such stories is Guy de Maupassant's "The Necklace" and Langston Hughes' "Salvation," where both characters are faced with social and community pressures and make the choice to lie rather than admit the truth. Maupassant's story concerns a woman, Mathilde borrows a diamond necklace to wear to a dance, for which her husband obtained a rare invitation. When the necklace is lost, she decides, with her husband, to replace it rather than tell the truth. In Langston Hughes' story, a young boy belongs to a church that was caught up in the fever of revival. "Everybody" in the church was "saved." Waiting in vain to "feel" saved, Langston succumbs to the pressure and pretends to be saved, under great cheering from the rest of the congregation. He is unable to admit this deception and spends the night crying himself to sleep. In both stories, the main characters succumb to social pressure and engage in a form of lying in order to reach the goals they believe society expects of them; the authors demonstrate this by using elements such as setting, symbolism, and irony. Both stories depict a setting that is essentially deceptive by nature. In "The Necklace," for example, great importance is placed upon social standing and the appearance
"Salvation" by Langston Hughes is an Essay written about the pressures young adults can face in their lifetime. It represented the life of a young boy and the pressures he received to accept Christ into his life. The story reflected lies, sarcasm, and hypocrisy from his peers, his family, both immediate and church. This young boy was told that Jesus would come to him, he would “See” Jesus, he would know. He was faced with the misconception of “How” Jesus would come to him, he was misguided. The young boy went forward anyway, walking to the pulpit, and accepting Christ. Although he had never experienced Jesus coming to him, he had never seen Jesus, he goes anyway, pretending to be saved due to social pressures. Later he returns home and cries
The characters in “A Jury of Her Peers” and “The Necklace“ are influenced by status, diction, and character. The stories are both set in time periods from long ago. These stories are very different, yet similar. The stories “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant and “A Jury of Her Peers” by Susan Glaspell use irony to emphasize the theme of fate vs. free will.
Willa Cather's Paul's Case and Maupassant's The Necklace When comparing two fictional characters from two different writers one must first and foremost analyze their dreams, ambitions, or goals in the story. Whether the character is setting out to accomplish something physically, or they are on a personal or spiritual quest to find themselves. A character's ambitions can reveal a lot of underlying qualities that may not be as apparent at first glance from the reader. While
In the story “Salvation”, by Langston Hughes, the church hosts a revival for the community. However, it is not a normal revival, the children are forced to go and get saved. The story conveys an underlying message of how adult family members put too much pressure on the youth of the family. Langston Hughes conveys this theme through the setting in the church and the characters.
The Necklace, by Guy De Maupassant, is about a woman, Mathilde, who will only lie because she doesn’t want to lose any of the fame or class that she has. Mathilde is similar to a bully that doesn’t want to show their true self because they are afraid that others will judge them. She is afraid that people will call her a thief, but in that process, she loses her natural beauty along with everything else she had. Even though both Mathilde and bullies are unique and don’t need to fit in, they lie about themselves and hate others instead of appreciating what they already
‘The Necklace’ is a morality tale written by Guy de Maupassant where he portrays the life of a beautiful but dissatisfied girl named Mathilde who desires to live a luxurious life despite being born into a clerk’s family and marrying a clerk too. Mathilde’s discontentment in life instigates her to pretend someone rich that she is not. Moreover, it leads her to severe trouble that caused ten years of hardship to Mathilde and her husband. So, this suffering is a punishment for Mathilde which taught her a lesson and changed her dramatically over the course of the story by making her a person of completely different personality for whom appearances
As a team, the goal of this presentation is to reveal to the class, how the Necklace can relate to modern day society. In order to understand and apply the reading to modern day society, we set the event to take place in court as an exaggeration to a situation that can be solved behind closed doors. By questioning the characters in the story, each will slowly reveal how the reading is applied to our everyday lives (such as modern day mentality, christian beliefs, and moral standards between friends).
In "The Necklace" the authors choice of words, or diction, is very well articulated. I enjoyed this story because the narrator, Guy de Maupassant sets us so much suspense with the tone of the story. Madame Louisel essentailly loses a valuable item, or so she thought, and goes to major extents and even life-deminishing problems to just make it seem like she was not responsible enough to take care of a necklace for a night.
Two of the greatest short stories written back in late 19th and early 20th centuries are still read by many people. The two stories are “A Rose for Emily” written by William Faulkner and Guy De Maupassant’s “The Necklace”. Faulkner’s book is about a woman named Emily Grierson’s life and her horrible secret she hides. The other book is about a materialistic woman named Mathilde Loisel loses a fake necklace and find out to be a fake one after ten years later. Although these stories are written about fifty years apart and written from two different countries, these two stories have many similarities and differences. “A Rose for Emily” and “The Necklace” are juxtaposed with the main characters, usage of symbolism on the title, and the tone
In Guy De Mauspassant's `The Necklace," the author examines the theme of how learning a difficult lesson about honesty can impact someone for the rest of their life. The author also examines the theme through the use of his title, the characters who act out the events, and the plot.
“Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breaths away”-Maya Angelou. This quote demonstrates that life isn’t about the amount of things one has or can do, but the time one spends with joy and fun, appreciating what they can do and have. In the short story, “The Necklace” by Guy De Maupassant, the main character does the exact opposite of what this quote represents, she learns the hard way. Madame Loisel, the main character, doesn't appreciate her ways of living and wants something to represent the lifestyle she wants to live. Madame borrows a diamond Necklace, loses it and rather than telling the truth, she lies and buys another. She ends up wasting 10 years of her life working hard to pay off debt. Madame then finds that the diamond necklace was nothing but paste though the replacement was real. Maybe if Madame had been grateful for who she was and what she had, she would’ve lived a better life. De Maupassant uses multiple internal and external conflicts to teach the reader that people should just be grateful for who they are,what they have and what they can do.
Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall (Proverbs 16:18) - It would be difficult to find an aphorism that better describes the fate of the main character in Guy de Maupassant’s short story, “The Necklace”. Set in Paris in the late 1800s, Maupassant’s story shows the costs of pride. The main character, Madame Loisel, borrows a diamond necklace from her rich friend, Madame Forestier, to wear at a ball hosted by the Minister of Public Instruction at the Palace of the Ministry. To her dismay, Madame Loisel loses the necklace, and she and her husband spend the next ten years paying back the loans they had to take out to replace the necklace, only to discover that the necklace was fake. Her pride plunges both her and
Although this two stories deal with women wishing their lives were different, there are large differences between them. The woman in "The Necklace" is ungrateful. She puts others like her husband out so that she can have what she thinks will make her happy. In my opinion, I don't even think she learns her lesson about how unimportant having expensive things is. Even after her husband slaves to pay back the money, when he didn't even want her to get the necklace in the first place; she seems ungrateful for his efforts. On the other hand, Miss Brill does no harm to anyone. It's as if it keeps her sane to lead this imaginary life once a week. To some people, taking a break from life and stepping back is necessary. Miss Brill does just that and results in no harm of other but most importantly, happiness for herself.
The nineteenth century French writer, Guy De Maupassant, tells an intriguing story in "The Necklace." He depicts the painful life of a beautiful woman, unhappily born into an average family of clerks. She felt that she was destined to marry into wealth but sadly found herself settling as she married an average copyist. Unlike the women of today, women in the nineteenth century were not fortunate enough to have a career of their own; they were either born into a wealthy family or married a man with money. In "The Necklace", Guy De Maupassant creatively reveals Mathilde Loisel's dreams of a decadent lifestyle. As her struggles start to unravel, it becomes obvious that her heartache is solely
One, noticeable part that plays a huge part in the theme is irony and/or suspense. In “The Necklace” the readers are suspenseful of if Mathilde will come out and tell the truth or try to cover up her steps. Mathilde hurries to find the diamond necklace that she has lost, and to find someone willing to work with her payment plan. Throughout this short story Mathilde faces hard tasks of work to receive the money until she can pay it off. Also, It was very suspenseful when overtime we watched Mathilde try to conquer her external conflict. Suspenseful was a feeling that took over most readers because most of them were worried that Mathilde’s friend was going to find out about to lost of the necklace. Also, Ironically the necklace was fake causing all of Mathilde’s hard work to be useless. Overall, this taught Mathilde a lesson.