The Necklace Group

Question:

germank
germank
Student
High School - 11th Grade

How do you think Guy de Maupassant wanted his readers to feel about the Loisels (both Mathilde and her husband)?

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Posted by germank on Saturday March 8, 2008 at 5:46 AM and tagged with husband, mathilde, the necklace.

Answers:


  1. clane Teacher
    High School - 10th Grade

    eNotes Editor

    Maupassant sets the stage for us to feel little sympathy for Mathilde and a lot for her husband who had to live with her. Maupassant spends a great deal of time developing the part of the story that pays out the life Mathilde had and the life she dreamed of having. She had a servant, but she wanted several who would bow to her every whim and she also wanted them to be adoring handsome young men. Nothing her husband ever did was good enough for her and she was not shy about letting him know. When he finally gets this invitation he thinks he will have succeeded in finally making his wife happy, but instead she complains that she has nothing good enough to wear. Maupassant wanted us, the readers, to get the lesson or moral, that one should be happy with what they have because it could always be worse. We, the readers, are glad that Mathilde learned her lesson the hard way, it seemed to be the only way in which she would learn. I still can hardly believe that her husband stood by her side and worked several jobs to help his ungrateful wife!

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    Posted by clane on Saturday March 8, 2008 at 12:15 PM