Symbolism In The Necklace

510 Words2 Pages

In the novel “The Necklace” the author gives several things that shows symbolism. The first symbol of the short story “The Necklace” gives us is the main character’s name… Mathilde. The story mentions “She was one of those pretty and charming girls”. This is close to the meaning of Mathilde. The meaning of Mathilde’s name was very ironic to her life, the story quotes, “as if by mistake of destiny, born in a family of clerks. She had no dowry, no expectations, no means of being known, understood, loved wedded, by any rich and distinguished man; and she let herself be married to a little clerk at the Ministry of Public Instruction. Mathilde valued expensive and exquisite things, because she believed that it would make her social status look …show more content…

The name of the Loisels street could be a symbol, the street name is Rue Des Martyrs. This could relate to the theme because Rue means, sorrow or regret, and at the end of the story Madame regrets wearing the Necklace her friend gave her because it put her in so much debt. One of the biggest symbols in the story is the necklace. Mathilde needed some jewelry for the ball so she borrowed a really nice necklace from her. Later in the story Mathilde ended up losing the necklace and tried to find it. They together searched jewelers to find the same exact necklace, then the story says “They found in a shop at the Palais Royal, a string of diamonds which seemed to them exactly like the one they looked for. It was worth forty thousand francs.” The couple buys the necklace and give it back to Mme Forestier, but it causes them to go into debt for ten years. After ten years Mathilde looks old and worn out from working a lot to pay off her debt. At the end of the story Mathilde confesses and tells her old friend that she lost the necklace, then Mme Forestier tells her that is was fake and it was only worth five hundred francs. This symbol shows us that the theme of the story is to be thankful for what you have and you shouldn’t be possessed by materials

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