The Necklace 4/27
“The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant is a story with a drastic character change that causes the reader to perceive her, Mme. Loisel, differently over the course of the story. In the beginning, Mme. Loisel seems like a selfish and needy woman, “‘It annoys me not to have a single jewel, not a single stone, nothing to put on. I shall look like distress.’(Maupassant 525)” Mme. Loisel is unable to accept the fact that she is not extremely wealthy. She feels that she must be of a higher class and have a nicer house; however, she does not do anything about it. Eventually, she decides to borrow some jewels from a friend for a ball. On that night, she looses them. She becomes exceedingly distraught and her understanding husband, who will do anything for her, does all he can to find a replacement. They have to give up every valuable item that they have and borrow an enormous amount of money in order to have enough to pay the jeweler for the new necklace. Additionally, they have to work for ten years to be able to repay their debts and Mme. Loisel learns what it feels like to be poor and not have anything nice. As a result, she will probably never complain about how bad her life was ever again as she used to.
