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When Monsieur Loisel returns home one evening, he triumphantly presents his superficial, ungrateful wife with a printed card and exclaims that they have been invited to an exclusive ball at the Ministry of Education. Monsieur Loisel is thrilled to receive the invitation and anticipates that his wife will share in his joy. Tragically, Mathilde Loisel responds by casually tossing the invitation on the table and asking, "What do you want me to do with that?" Monsieur Loisel is surprised and taken back by his wife's cold reaction, and he attempts to explain that it is extremely rare for a clerk like himself to attend such a magnificent event.
Unfortunately, Mathilde Loisel remains incredulous and only becomes more irritated. Mathilde believes that she will be embarrassed if she attends the ball and has no desire to go. Mathilde then brings up the fact that she has nothing to wear, and she...
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starts to cry. When Monsieur Loisel attempts to console her, she tells him to give the invitation to some colleague whose wife is better equipped than her. In an attempt to appease his wife, Monsieur Loisel offers to give her four hundred francs to purchase a new dress for the ball. However, Mathilde is still not pleased and insists on wearing jewelry to avoid being "humiliated." She then visits her friend Madame Forestier and ends up borrowing what she thinks is an authentic diamond necklace to wear to the ball.
Describe Madame Loisel's reaction to the invitation in "The Necklace."
When Mdme. Loisel reads the invitation to the ball that The Minister of Public Instruction and Madame Georges Ramponneau give Monsieur Loisel, she is far from excited, as her husband had hoped:
Instead of being delighted, as her husband had hoped, she threw the invitation on the table crossly, muttering: "What do you wish me to do with that?"
Mdme. Loisel reacts this way because she is the type of woman who, as she is described by the narrator, suffers all the time for feeling that she was "born" to enjoy all the delicacies of life. However, this is not the case at all. Mdme. Loisel is part of a family of clerks, and is also married to one. Her aspirations and wishes do not come from a genuine understanding of how life should be better if you are rich, but from the assumption that money makes everything better.
Therefore, when Mdme. Loisel thows the invitation on the table, she is angry, first, because she does not have a gown to wear to the ball. Additionally, she feels that she should not go because she could never be parallelled to the other women, who surely will be there with new gowns and jewels.
Hence, the best way to describe Madame Loisel's reaction is that she must have thrown that letter with disgust, anger, haughtiness, and with the snob characteristics that are typical of someone who thinks of herself much higher than what she should. For this reason, she feels that nothing is enough: when she goes to her friend Madame Forestier's to borrow jewels for the ball, she picks the shiniest and most noteworthy. The fact that she could not tell right away that the piece that she thought was so expensive was, actually, a fake, is what tells us that Mdme. Loisel only thinks that she was born for bigger and better things. As the narrator tells us, this is way far from the truth:
She dressed plainly because she could not dress well, but she was unhappy as if she had really fallen from a higher station; [...]. Natural ingenuity, instinct for what is elegant, a supple mind are [women's] sole hierarchy, and often make of women of the people the equals of the very greatest ladies.
Hence, her reaction goes from (perhaps) a bit of excitement for the invitation, and then goes to frustration from the realization of not having something nice to wear. It then becomes sadness and anger for not being in a better station in life. Finally, it becomes petulant, for she does not have to be so ungrateful as to slam the envelop across the table after her husband has brought her such nice news.
In "The Necklace," how does Madame Loisel react to the invitation?
Madame Loisel was a woman who desired to go to parties, to have a lot of fancy dresses, and to move in rich social circles. She expressed this desire to her husband often, and was discontented and unsatisfied with her current life that was devoid of any luxuries and fine social events. So, when her husband brings home an invitation to a super fancy dinner party and dance, one would expect her reaction to be one of happiness and joy. Instead, ironically, she is upset. The text states,
"Instead of being delighted, as her husband had hoped, she threw the invitation on the table crossly, muttering: 'What do you wish me to do with that?'"
Her husband is astonished--he can't believe that she isn't excited about this invitation to an event like she has craved for years. She goes on to explain that she has no dress to wear to such an event--is she supposed to go dressed like a pauper? And, she has no jewels or pretty things to adorn herself with. So, the invitation just upsets her, because it is useless without the propoer party gear to wear. She refuses to show up in any of her dresses. It's not a very grateful reaction, but, gratefulness is not Madam Loisel's strongpoint.
Her husband sacrifices money to get a dress, and she borrows a necklace from a friend, and it is only after these things occur that she is finally happy and excited about the invite. But her initial reaction was one of dismay and unhappiness. I hope that those thoughts helped; good luck!