The Necklace by Maupassant

“The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant “The Necklace” is the story of a middle class couple, the Loisels, who acquire an invitation to a ball. Concerned only with her appearance, Mathilde buys a new dress, borrows jewelry from a friend and has her ideal night at the ball. When the diamond necklace is lost on the way home, a much too expensive yet identical replacement is found for 36,000 francs. The loss is concealed from the friend, and their comfortable middle class life is traded for a poorer one so that the money borrowed for the diamonds can be repaid. After all debts are settled, Mathilde runs into the friend and reveals the secret. The friend reveals her own - “…mine was imitation. It was worth at the very most five hundred francs”. Maupassant’s story reveals not only how vanity can ruin one’s life, but also “radix malorum est cupiditas”- greed is the root of all evil. Mathilde Loisel was “… one of those pretty and charming women born as though fate had blundered, into a family of junior clerks” and married a minor clerk. She lived in a modest home, though she “suffered endlessly, feeling herself born for every delicacy and luxury”. She had clothes, a maid, and plenty of food to eat, yet often times found herself imagining her adequate surroundings greater and more ornate than her reality. She felt her fantasy was “… the only things she loved; she felt that she was made for them”. Mathilde had one friend from her school years who was living out the fantasy of money and status, but was hesitant to visit. When she would return from these visits of grandeur, she would “weep all day with grief, regret, despair and misery”. These pangs of jealousy would overcome her, even in her life of adequacy and comfort as these were less important to her than her appearance. Her husband, who is not surprised at his wife’s requests for the finer things in life, at one point tells her “how stupid you are” when she asks for more, never satisfied with what she has or who she is. He knows that she has all she needs, though it may not be what she wants or feels she deserves, and seems almost appalled at her complaints for luxuries beyond their means. Madame Forestier is the friend that the necklace is borrowed from. She is the one person in Mathilde’s life who has done well for herself, living the dream Mathilde so desperately wants. At the end of the story, Madame Forestier reveals that the borrowed jewelry is merely costume and worth far less than the replacement necklace. By disclosing this, she shows Mathilde that life is about perception; sometimes objects appearing as precious to those who are without them can hold little value. She also shows that just because one has the means to afford the finer things in life, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you need them when imitation can still have its desirable effects.