Everything in life has a value, but not every person sees it the same. Some things may seem like plastic to some while it is everything to others. Nobody can truly give the value of anything because it is different for everybody. Someone can tell another the price of everything but never the value. Many times something that is inexpensive has more value than something that only a millionaire can buy. In the short stories, “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant and “The Amber Bracelet” by Zong Pu the characters show that nobody can truly tell the difference between what is real and what is simply a cheap imitation Beauty is in the eye of the beholder as demonstrated in these two short stories. Guy de Maupassant, whose full name is Henri Ren …show more content…
Mathilde is the protagonist of this story. She was blessed with physical beauty but is missing the wealth that she wants. Her husband, Monsieur Loisel, is a clerk of the Ministry of Public Instruction and is content with the simple life he and Mathilde live. They are not wealthy but they have enough to get by comfortably, according to Monsieur Loisel, although Mathilde has a very different opinion. Madame Forestier is Mathilde’s wealthy childhood friend whose life Mathilde is extremely jealous of. Mathilde becomes depressed when she is invited to a party at Madame Forestiers and has nothing to “put on her back.” Monsieur Loisel would do anything for his wife, including giving her the four hundred francs he has saved to buy himself a gun so that she could buy a new fancy dress. She now has a pretty dress to wear but is still not content because it annoys her “not to have a single piece of jewelry” (Maupassant) and is convinced “there’s nothing more humiliating than to look poor among other women who are rich” (Maupassant). Her husband again saves the day by suggesting she borrows something from her Madame Forestier. Mathilde anxiously asked to borrow a “superb diamond necklace” (Maupassant) thinking it was the most valuable thing in the world. The day of the ball everyone notices Mathilde and she is “intoxicated by pleasure, forgetting all in the triumph of her …show more content…
Nobody can really tell the difference between real and fake whether it is a piece of jewelry or a person. In “The Necklace” Mathilde did not know anything about the value of jewelry so she assumed it was expensive when really it was a piece of costume jewelry. This causes her to throw her whole life away. In “The Amber Bracelet” Breeze accepts what she has been handed and although her necklace may have no value to everyone else, it means everything to her because it came from someone she cares about. The value someone puts on an item can completely change a person’s life. If Mathilde accepted who she was and what she had would these events still have happened? Maybe if Mathilde was happy with the way her life was she would not have had to borrow the necklace and would not have had to spend all her money on a new one and spend ten years paying it off. Instead, she had ten miserable years and dragged her husband down with her, when she could have had many happy years with her husband and childhood friend. In both stories the protagonist wanted something they thought had value but learned had none. Not only can a person not tell real versus fake with objects, but also with people. In “The Amber Necklace the reader sees that Manager Lin has different personalities depending on who she is talking to. When she picked up her phone she answered in a “completely different tone” and her mother commented that “In
If you have something already should be proud of what you have and not think of all the things you think you deserve because you can't get what you don't have without giving effort and the final result will be worse. Guy de Maupassant's parents got divorced when he was 11 and his mother was raising him alone. He always looked differently at the rich, so he decided to write a short story on how people should treat everything they have with care and not ask for more than you can afford because the final result may be worse. In "The Necklace" he develops his theme of how objects can change people through the literary terms situational irony and foreshadowing.
Other details in the story also have a similar bearing on Mathilde’s character. For example, the story presents little detail about the party scene beyond the statement that Mathilde is a great “success” (7)—a judgment that shows her ability to shine if given the chance. After she and Loisel accept the fact that the necklace cannot be found, Maupassant includes details about the Parisian streets, about the visits to loan sharks, and about the jewelry shop in order to bring out Mathilde’s sense of honesty and pride as she “heroically” prepares to live her new life of poverty. Thus, in “The Necklace,” Maupassant uses setting to highlight Mathilde’s maladjustment, her needless misfortune, her loss of youth and beauty, and finally her growth as a responsible human being.
In Guy de Maupassant’s story, The Necklace, he utilizes situational irony in order to highlight the theme. He displays this irony in order to reveal several themes that can be observed in the story. One of the major themes in this short story is how appearances can be misleading.
In 1785, the court jewelers, Bohmer and Basange, constructed a necklace with five hundred and forty diamonds of varying sizes in an ugly arrangement that resembled the collars worn by circus animals. They hoped that King Louis XV would purchase it for his favorite, Madame du Barry. Unfortunately, the king died before the necklace was completed. So, naturally the jewelers tried to sell the piece to the newly crowned Queen, Marie Antoinette, because she was known for her extravagant spending and taste. They priced the jewelry at and equivalent of two million dollars in modern money. The Queen declined the offer. She did not like the necklace and the price was even too high for her. Knowing that they would be ruined if the Queen didn’t buy their product the jewelers continued to plead with her for ten years. Each time she turned them down. Then, one day the Queen received a note signed by Bassange which said, “We have real satisfaction in thinking that the most beautiful set of diamonds in existence will belong to the greatest and best of Queens.” Puzzled by the message, the Queen, put the note to flame by a candle sitting on a nearby table (Komroff 85).
Values are spread all around the world, and many people’s values differ. These can lead to people being judged, or indirectly characterized by other people. In “The Necklace” Mme. Loisel is a beautiful woman with a decent life, and a husband that loves her, and only wants to make her happy. She is not rich but she makes it along, she insists of a better, wealthier life. When her husband gets her invited to a ball, she feels the need for a brand new fancy dress and tons of jewelry. When the couple realizes they cannot afford jewelry as well, they search out to borrow her friend, Mme. Forestiers’ necklace. She comes to notice she no longer has the necklace on when she leaves the ball. This later troubles her, as she has to work for a long time to collect enough money to buy a new necklace. This story describes the relationship between a couple, who have different dreams, and how desires can revamp your life. Guy de Maupassant, the author of “The Necklace” uses literary devices to prove people come before materialistic items.
“The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant is about a girl who lives a poor and unfortunate life. She dreams of living in a high class society with many riches and jewels. She sees herself as something important and a person that everyone should respect as a valuable person. The only way Mathilde Loisel can be satisfied with herself and be content is by having expensive objects in her possession. Unfortunately for her she does not have the opportunity or the availability to buy luxurious items for self and becomes frustrated. Without the things that she desires she can not feel happy about how she is living and can not appreciate what she has. Her strong need for the expensive things makes her sad and sorrowful because she lives a normal life with her husband. Attending to typical housewife duties like cooking and cleaning, when she rather be wearing lavish clothes and fancy jewelry.
The late Irish poet Oscar Wilde once stated, "In the world, there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.” This quote accurately describes human nature to the extent that man is never fully satisfied with his current possessions. In fact, most people who rely on materialistic items for happiness are typically desolated and miserable. This story is based on an archaic view on women, where women have no caste or hierarchy. The people grade women based off their looks and beauty. Money “practically makes nobility” (Shmoop). It “enables the user to pay for the high life” (Shmoop) and confine the person with luxurious items known to man. Money controls the life of people, rather than vise versa, causing greed. Malthide, who is the wife of a minor clerk, has immense greed to live a sumptuous life. Malthide’s greed led to her destruction and turmoil, however her grief is what taught her an everlasting lesson.
Furthermore, the lifestyle both women want ends up in disaster however, one ends in death while the other in hard labor. In "The Necklace", the wife ends up losing her friend’s expensive necklace which causes her to work hard to earn enough money to pay of a new one. Due to all the work she loses her beauty. In contrast, whereas in "The Jewels" the constant attendance of the opera house during the winter causes her to die of inflammation which resulted a deep sorrow towards the husband. Both wife’s lived life differently. Both tries to find the best way to fulfill their desire for the good
The message to value more important things in order to have a wisely spent life is demonstrated very well through literary devices in “The Necklace”, by Guy de Maupassant. Madame undergoes an ironic moment in life as she learns what is worth valuing. She is a very greedy woman who only cares about herself. The reader would never think of her as the person to do work, but that thought changes as she misplaces what she thinks of as a valuable item. If Madame just learned how to live life in a way that will not make her upset and to value things that are valuable towards life instead of expenses, she will be better off. But this is how Madame views her life, while others take notice of the significance in their lives. Values are different towards people across the world, and Guy de Maupassant defines that in his short story, “The Necklace”.
“The Necklace” is about a woman of lower class who wants to become different than her true self. At this ball, she acts to be someone who is wealthy for the night to impress those around her because everything for her seems to be about money and fame. The song, “Just a Girl” relates to the story because it shows how she let the money get to her, what she is like when she sees her old friend after many harsh years, what her husband thinks of her, and lastly how she confused where she stood in the class systems.
Some, such as Toby Syoboda, claim that “human beings lack any evidence for the position that non-human entities have intrinsic value”. Svoboda proposes that we cannot assign intrinsic value, as in another world that thing may not possess any value at all; however, I propose that things can have intrinsic value on the grounds that they are valuable with no regard to their function in human society, meaning that value does not come from being instrumental. I believe intrinsic value is something can exist with and without instrumental value; the most apparent example of something with both forms of value is friends; whilst friends do have instrumental value by giving us connections and doing us favours, they also have value in-themselves. Of course, I expect a friend to help me if they can, but if they cannot I value them no less, even though their instrumental value would be less significant to me. Moreover, there are also instances where things have had instrumental value, that has been lost or taken away leaving purely intrinsic value. A prime example of this is Marilyn Monroe’s “Happy Birthday, Mr. President Dress”. This year, the dress sold at auction for $4.8 million, so that it can be displayed in Ripley’s Believe it or Not Museum. Normally, an expensive dress is purchased as it is well fitted, or made of a material which will last a long time but ultimately to make the person wearing it more attractive. However, in this instance, one of histories most expensive dresses is merely sitting in a display. Whilst the dress could have this instrumental value, the intrinsic value overwhelms it to the extent that its instrumental purpose becomes redundant. On the other hand, we can also have value completely exclusive of instrumental value. For instance, Van Gogh’s painting, The Starry Night, to most people, holds absolutely no
The Necklace also displays distinctive realism in the use of socioeconomic influences which are essential to the plot. The major conflict in the story would be absent and the theme would not be obtainable without Mathilde Loisel’s insecurity about her own socioeconomic reputation. An example of Loisel’s self-deprivation nature is presented when she realizes she does not have a necklace, she says “I shall look absolutely no one. I would almost rather not go to the party” (Maupassant, sec. 3). Another example of the self-conflict caused by social pressure is Loisel’s immediate attempt to replace the necklace and her reluctance to speak to her friend Madame Forestier about the necklace for ten whole years. If she were not conflicted by societal pressures she might have avoided the whole situation altogether. The Necklace establishes a realistic difference in value between the necklaces and proposed clothing. Her husband proposes flowers which were valued 10 franks so in any case if she had chosen the flowers there would have been an insignificant economic loss. Her decision not to tell her friend about the necklace ends up costing her seven times the worth of the original. The roses symbolize the simpler things in life to the theme of the story. Mathilde Loisel’s withered appearance at the end
This story is about Matilda and her husband. Matilda receives an invitation to attend to a party, but she has no jewelry to wear, so she borrows one from a rich friend. Unfortunately, Matilda loses the necklace at the party and has to buy a new one worth thirty-five thousand francs. She works for years to repay all the money she borrowed, but when she finally gets all the money, she finds out the necklace was worth “No more than five hundred francs.” This story has two unexpected twists in it: she loses the necklace and she works for years to pay it off, only to find out it is less than one sixth of what she paid. How Matilda deals with finding out the price is left to the reader’s imagination, but it shows that when Matilda loses the necklace she deals with it relatively calmly, borrowing money to buy a new one and later working for years to pay it
In the case of the woman in the story "The necklace" the object being the necklace which she eventually loses and tries to replace. Instead of hiding the truth and facing the music, which was harder, to take than when she lied. The old adage which says," What a tangled web weave when we first start to deceive." We humans can't handle the truth. We think we know what is the truth. What that really is just bullshit. It's arrogance-playing tricks on our minds making us think we are in control of our lives. If we really were in control of our lives then why can't we control every little aspect of it that gives discomfort? Because we can't, because we don't know how, and eventually the truth will show that is we don't what the truth really is. Using the slippery slope logic one can conclude that the two stories are more similar than they are different but because the assignment at hand requires for me to compare and contrast in an illustrative manner then I guess I should start.
In “The Necklace,” Mathilde’s internal struggle is with herself. She mentally battled with the physical and financial limitations placed on her, but more with her own soul. She was unhappy with her place in life and could not accept the simplicity of her station, believing it to be truly beneath her. “All those things… tortured her and made her angry. “ Her husband’s blatant acceptance of their place only fueled her frustrations further.