The Necklace Short Story

In this essay, The Ways We Lie, Ericsson writes examples of lies we tell daily. She explains that not all the lies we tell are intentional. We choose to make life easier by lying. This essay also highlights situations that occur in everyday life. Ericson explains that “The white lie assumes that the truth will cause more damage than a simple, harmless untruth.” (89) She then continue to explain that a “white lie” can be dangerous simply because telling the truth could ease a lot of pain.

“The Ways We Lie” is an essay written by Stephanie Ericsson, first published in the Utne Reader in 1993. The Utne Reader is an American magazine that publishes pieces from alternative media sources. However, the essay was mostly directed toward people who have told a lie at least once in their life and have may have felt guilty about it. The purpose for the piece was developed using original syntax, logical appeals, and descriptive tropes, the purpose being that one should think twice before telling a lie.

In the essay The Ways We Lie, author Stephanie Ericsson writes in depth about the different types of lies used by most people everyday. While listing examples of them, Ericsson questions her own experiences with lying and whether or not it was appropriate. By using hypothetical situations, true accounts, and personal occurrences, she highlights the moral conflicts and consequences that are a result of harmless fibs or impactful deceptions. In an essay detailing the lies told to ourselves and others, Ericsson points out one bold truth; everyone lies. Through her writing, Ericsson causes the reader to look into how they’ve lied in the past and how to effects others and the general greater good of society.

The Story of an Hour and The Necklace share many similarities and also many differences; both explore the feeling that both wives harbor towards their husbands and the lack of communication that both wives share. In this essay I will discuss the similarities and differences that the two short stories share with regards to communication.

Consequences and stress are a common outcome of lies, yet people still commit them to deliberately hide the truth. “...Brad Blanton says you’re unnecessarily complicating your life.” Lies that are told often are intended to keep another’s feelings from being hurt, and in the end cause even more damage. Stress and other mental

People who are driven by greed end up focusing on what they do not have instead of being grateful for what they do have. This is relevant in the short story “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant because Mathilde Loisel ends up losing everything she owns just because she lets greed drive her decisions and get the best of her. When receiving an invitation to an extravagant ball, she declines because she says she does not have anything nice to wear. In the beginning of the short story she says, “There is nothing more humiliating than looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich women.(Maupassant).” The reader sees how she puts value in possessions and what others think of her. After finding a dress and then borrowing a necklace that she thought

Around the world, values are expressed differently. Some people think that life is about the little things that make them happy. Others feel the opposite way and that expenses are the way to live. In Guy de Maupassant’s short story, “The Necklace”, he develops a character, Madame Loisel, who illustrates her different style of assessments. Madame Loisel, a beautiful woman, lives in a wonderful home with all the necessary supplies needed to live. However, she is very unhappy with her life. She feels she deserves a much more expensive and materialistic life than what she has. After pitying herself for not being the richest of her friends, she goes out and borrows a beautiful necklace from an ally. But as she

We exaggerate, we minimize, we avoid confrontation, we spare people’s feelings, we conveniently forget, we keep secrets, we justify lying to the big-guy institutions. ”(Page 472 of Patterns for College Writing). The author analyzes the way individuals use lies to help and hurt themselves in everyday lives. Ericcson writes this essay not single out individuals or censor them, but to make people as a whole really deliberate before lying.

The universal theme of “lying is apart of everyone’s nature,” is evident quite often in,

To many people, a lie has little significance. Some people tell lies as a way to cover something up, make a different name for themselves, or just to make excuses. No matter what the situation, my father has constantly reminded me that the truth will set you free, and as I get older even though I am still in my youth, the more I realize the truth and importance of that statement. To me a lie is a form of disloyalty, the less you respect the person the more you lie to them as a way to cover up your true identity. A lie is when you mislead what is really the truth; where you don’t tell the full truth in order to deceive someone, or you avoid being honest at all. There are several different outcomes to

Lying is a virtue that’s known for being bad, as something that can’t have any good come from it. But when it’s the only way for you or cherished ones to be safe and alive, lying becomes a trait that’s not only useful, but life saving. Such as covering for an LGBT person in an unaccepting and bigoted home. Taken to the extremes, this form of covering could also be hiding Jewish families in your own home during WWII in Germany. It’s this ability to deceive and disobey that could mean life or death of an innocent

In “The Necklace,” Guy De Maupassant describes Mathilde Loisel a middle class woman who desperately wishes to be a part of the luxurious life, one night her dreams come true at a ministerial ball but at a terrible cost that put Mathilde in poverty. Similarly, in “The Ways We Lie,” Stephanie Ericsson explains that we should consider the meaning of our actions, such as deception and lies. The extent of omitting a fact is when there is risky consequences that can harm people. It is wrong when omission of facts is a lie because conflicts arise when the truth is hidden by completely turning a person's life upside. Although the omission of facts is easier than to face the truth, I claim that the omission of facts is wrong because failing to tell the truth leads to painful consequences. Additionally, I believe both Maupassant and Ericsson agree that it is wrong to omit facts as a lie when serious consequences is a result, hence Mathilde is forced to waste ten years of her life because of a lie; similarly when Ericsson describes the omission of facts is a lie when a lie gives a false impression and is purposefully meant to deceive.

Judith Viorst’s “The Truth about Lying” briefly introduces the topic of Protective lies, in which one lies to protect the other party from the truth; however, it is very presumptuous to assume we always know what’s “good” for the person. Even if, going by the previous example, one knows telling the truth about the money and being forced to buy alcohol for the father is going to have a bad effect on the father, we never know the intentions behind the drinking of the father, or whether the father is saving up secretly for the daughter. There are so many ‘what-ifs’ that we cannot presumably present lying as fully justifiable. Thus, even if lying may be with good intentions, I claim that Miriam’s statement is true because lying destroys the trust in both sides of the relationship, avoids instead of resolves conflicts, and maintains boundaries.

At first glance, Chopin’s Story of an Hour (1894) and de Maupassant’s The Necklace (1884), appear to have very little in common. Chopin’s story, as displayed in its title is quite short; while in comparison, de Maupassant tells a much more detailed account of the beleaguered Loisel’s, who must learn from the self-centred Madam Loisel. With de Maupassant’s depiction of his female protagonist as selfish and ungrateful; it is difficult to fathom Chopin, known for her active role in describing woman's oppression in the nineteenth century. Interestingly, Chopin, a realist, did consider de Maupassant to

when she hears of her husband’s death. Although she is not stuck as many women would have