The Necklace

Guy De Maupassant’s “The Necklace” is about the dangers of materialism. In his story, Mme. Loisel has desire for wealth. She constantly dreams about having luxuries and delicacies that she can never afford to have. Because of her materialistic nature, she causes many different hardships for herself and her husband. Through the characters of Mme. Loisel and her husband, Guy de Maupassant illustrates how Mme. Loisel’s materialistic nature causes suffering for herself, her husband, and for the both of them.

Mme. Loisel suffers from her real life due to her materialistic nature. Mme. Loisel has a desire for wealth. She believes she is “born for all the delicacies and all the luxuries” and should live a life of luxury (130). She is supposed to

Loisel and her husband suffer together from poverty due to her materialistic nature. Mme. Loisel also refuses to go to the party because she does not have a “single jewel, not a single stone, nothing to put on” (131). Although she can wear something else, such as natural flowers that “were pretty stylish at this time of the year,” she refuses because wearing flowers will make her look poor; she believes “there’s nothing more humiliating than to look poor among other women who are rich” (131). She insists on jewelry because to her jewelry represents wealth. Since all the rich people wear jewelry, whoever wears jewelry is assumed to be rich. In addition, people gauge how rich a person is based on how fancy the necklace is. Because of her materialistic nature, she wants to wear only the best jewelry, so she borrows an expensive diamond necklace from her friend Mme. Forestier; however, after the party, she loses the necklace. After they lost the necklace, both Mme. Loisel and her husband suffer from poverty. They did not have enough money to buy a replacement, so they had to borrow. Her husband “gave up notes, took up ruinous obligations, dealt with usurers and all the race of lenders” (134). He “compromised all the rest of his life, risked his signature without even knowing if he could meet it” just so they can acquire enough money to buy the replacement (134). Afterwards, they suffer from working hard to pay back the borrowed money. They had to dismiss their servants and changed their house to a garret under roof. Mme. Loisel suffer from “heavy housework” and “odious cares of the house” (134). She had to bargain and defend her “miserable money sou by sou” when she “went to the fruitier, the grocer, the butcher”; her husband suffer from working “in the evening making a fair copy of some tradesman’s accounts, and late at night he often copied manuscript for five sous a page” (134). Every month they had to “meet some notes, renew others, obtain more