Maupassant and Thurber's Use of Irony and Conflict to Explore and View Marital Relationships

Guy de Maupassant and Chinua Achebe show their opinions on materialism through the thoughts of their characters in their stories. In “The Necklace”, Mathilde, an avaricious and narcissistic character, believes she possesses “...no dowry, no hopes, not the slightest chance of being appreciated, understood, loved, and married by a rich and distinguished man” (de Maupassant 373). The author, Guy de Maupassant, mocks Mathilde’s attitude towards her life, claiming “...She suffered constantly, feeling that all the attributes of a gracious life, every luxury, should rightly have been hers” (de Maupassant 373). By showing Mathilde’s thoughts, the author shows how materialism can cause someone to unappreciate the life that they have, even when it is exceptional compared to

In the short story, “The Necklace”, by Guy de Maupassant, the author reveals the consequences of envy. In this story, Mathilde is a very desirous woman, who has always dreamed of a fantasy that she could not have. She is discontented and jealous of other women who are wealthy. Then one day, Mathilde fantasy became a reality, Mr. Loisel husband received an invitation to the Palace of Ministry ball. Her husband, Mr. Loisel, thought that this would make his wife very happy since that is what she spends all of her time daydreaming about. However, she reacts in a very negative way and is reluctant to attend the party due to her not having a fancy dress. Mr. Loisel sympathized with his wife and knowing he had money set aside for a new shotgun,

“She so much longed to please, be envied, be fascinating and sought after” (de Maupassant 67). The main character desires to be at the center of attention, she wants to be coveted by others. In his fictional short story titled, “The Necklace,” Guy de Maupassant writes about how the lusting for more may cause people to be blinded and unable to see/value the treasures they already have. The story begins with an introduction of a lady who daydreams about the happiness that materialistic yearnings can bring her, forgetting her situation and social class. After taking her husband’s recommendation to borrow jewelry, specifically a diamond necklace, from her close friend Madame Forestier to wear alongside her dress at the evening reception, the main character later discovers that she had lost the necklace. Following their failure to find the necklace, Madame and Monsieur Loisel devise a plan to borrow money to replace the necklace with another and in doing so, fall into years of debt. Moreover, Maupassant uses direct characterization, imagery and situational irony to further depict why you should be grateful for what you already have before it’s too late.

The moral of this short story, “The Necklace” is that everyone should be grateful for what they have, who their dating, and how life is provided for them. The wife was far from grateful, she was greedy. For example, her husband provided her with an envelope with an invitation to a ball and handed her. Her response was unnecessary. She should have been grateful that she got an invitation. “Instead of being delighted as her husband expected, she threw the invitation on the table with disgust, muttering, "What do you think I can do with that?" "But, my dear, I thought you would be pleased. You never go anywhere, and this is such a rare opportunity. I had hard work to get it. Everyone is wild to go: it is very select, and invitations to clerks

Have you ever been greedy, and wanted something that you would have done anything to get? Although it is fine to want something, sometimes it can rule your thoughts and actions and you do things that are not right and may hurt other people. In “The Necklace”, the story is mainly about a woman who longs to have been born into a better life. She consistently complains and goes to extreme lengths to look wealthy, and because of her selfishness, it results in her and her husband having to give up all they have and spend their life working. In The Necklace, author Guy de Maupassant uses dramatic irony, irony, and imagery, to communicate the theme of greed and what that leads to.

She became heavy, rough, harsh, like one of the poor. Her hair untended, her skirts askew, her hands red, her voice shrill” (Maupassant 233). So far, this necklace, this tiny little necklace has cost her everything. Her indulgence took away what little money she had, what little time, happiness, and youth. This lesson shows the reader that the deceiving everyone into believing she was a wealthy woman was not at all worth it for

In the short story, “The Necklace,” by Guy de Maupassant, Mathilde Loisel represented the zenith of one of the seven deadly sins: Pride in the form of vanity. Loisel allowed herself to become blind to the inconsistency of her rational subconscious. Through allowing her husband’s pride, as well as her own, move into the spotlight upon the realization of her mistakes, Loisel effectively accelerated herself out of her comfortable life and into one of utter hardship and discourse. There is great irony in this process because by trying to claim her supremacy in the face of “rich society,” Loisel effectively became a catalyst for a result which is the polar opposite. The consequences of Loisel’s vanity and the explicit descriptions of her fantasies

In the beginning of the story, she is focused only on material items and cares only about things like jewelry, makeup, and dresses. She also has the belief that she “married down” in society, and that she is destined for better things. Her husband comes home one day, with an invitation to a high-class social party. She should be excited and grateful; it is the opportunity she has been waiting for, but she manages to find a negative. Loisel asks her husband, “[W]hat do you expect me to wear if I go” (Maupassant)? Then, she demands him to buy her a new dress, but still, it isn’t enough. She goes to her friend, Madame Forestier, to borrow a piece of jewelry, and she chooses a “diamond” necklace. Finally, she is ready to go to the party, and she has a great time; it is what she had been dreaming about for her whole life. However, when she returns home afterwards, she notices that her necklace went missing. She and her husband search for a week, but they realize that it will not be found. They decide to swallow their pride and buy a replacement. It is discovered that a similar necklace is on sale, but it costs them around 40,000 pounds. It takes the Loisels a decade to pay off the necklace, but their hard work pays off. Madame becomes a disciplined woman, and her priorities shift from greed to hard work and determination, and she is proud of what she had accomplished. This shows that people can change their perspective and learn to be a better

However, as the years pass while Mathide and her husband struggle to repay the loans taken out to pay for the genuine diamond necklace, Mathide becomes much less attached to envious thoughts of rising above the social and economic class into which she was born. The couple’s quality of living suffers greatly, as they transition from a relative luxurious life that includes an in-house servant and state-of-the-art commodities for the time, to a rented attic room and a schedule of non-stop labor. The purpose of this transition seems clear, as Mathide’s envy and vanity are overwhelmed by the dreariness of life, much worse than she likely ever imagined for

She is a typical lady fixated on progressing to high society. For one night, she sneaks a look at the life she's lost when she buys a 400-franc dress and gets what she accepts to be a jewel accessory from her companion. She takes fulfillment not in the utility of these things but rather in their appearances. They make men see her at the gathering and ladies begrudge her. At last, Madame Loisel's fixation on belonging is her undoing.

“No... there’s nothing so humiliating as looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich women” (83), declares Matilde Loisel in Guy de Maupassant’s short story, “The Necklace.” At the center of the narratives is Madame Loisel’s self-centered actions. Madame Loisel believes she deserves more than a life of distress and modesty. Madame Loisel’s weakness of character, specifically her discontentment and selfish nature, causes her to waste ten years of the life she detested. The main reason Madame Loisel’s life ends in tragedy is her own unhappiness.

Madame Loisel wanted a new dress and and new jewelry and new things for her house and she wanted to be just like the other women and wanted to be wealthy just like them she wanted to have a good dinner everyday and she was disappointed because she didn't have nothing and she married a little clerk. Madame loisel wanted to got to the ball the her husband and her got invited to but she didn't have no fancy dress no shoes and no jewels they didn't have enough francs just to get what she wanted so her husband borrowed money from people and got enough for shoes and a dress. Madame loisel and her husband borrowed a diamond necklace from Madame Forestier for the ball. When Madame Loisel and her husband went to the ball she seen other women wearing

In the story, the father of the middle-class family beliefs that all his problems come from the lack of money. The story starts off by the father dropping off his kids at school and the bumper falling of his car. Throughout the story he’s constantly putting himself down: “Note to future generations: Park Avenue = type of car. Ours not new. Ours oldish”. This quote is an example of him telling the reader that he is suffering financially. As the story goes on the father reveals that he feels pressured by society and his own family. Also he one of his problems in the story is that he believes that he does not satisfy his kids enough. This all make him believe that all of his problems will go away if he was upper class, this is actually the reason

In the story “The Necklace” written by Guy de Maupassant, Madame Loisel’s attitude and perspective on life changes for the good. At the beginning of the story she is very needy and ungrateful, “She had no evening clothes, no jewels, nothing. But those were the things she wanted: she felt that was the kind of life for her” (Maupassant 226). Madame Loisel “burst out weeping” when she was informed they were attending an evening event without a nice dress to wear (227). She was handed 400 francs that her husband was saving for a rifle. She was to buy a nice dress for the event. Although she buys an evening dress, she still thought she looked to poor to attend the event. She had asked to borrow a necklace from a friend, but she lost it later that

In Guy de Maupassant’s The Necklace, the main character, Mathilde Loisel, is very materialistic, but in fact, loses her happiness due to it. Although she was in middle class, she has no financial problem with living. Still, she is not satisfied nor thankful for what she was given, and is always pessimistic about her life by comparing herself to her rich friend, Mme Forestier, or believing that fancy, expensive objects such as dress and necklace has the power to control her happiness.