what do you expect me to wear if I go?” Madame Loisel plays the victim and egotistically expects her husband to solve her problem for her!

Second, after he suggests the dress that she normally wears to the theater, Madame Loisel weeps,

Only I have no dress and so I can't go to this party. Give your invitation to a friend whose wife has better clothes than I do.

Too ungrateful to acknowledge the dress she already owns, she selfishly implies that she deserves “better clothes” or a newer, fancier dress. Also, her retort that her husband give the invitation to someone else “whose wife has better clothes than I do” reveals her insecurity. Madame Loisel believes that others look down on her and that only a lady with "better" clothes deserves to attend the party. Finally, she selfishly denies her husband his own joy; she just wants him to give away the invitation and thus not attend the party himself. Ultimately, she manipulates him into giving her money to purchase a beautiful dress in order to appear wealthier at the party.

Third, despite attaining a new four hundred-franc dress (which her husband bought with money he was saving to buy himself a gun and take a well-deserved hunting trip), she still is unsatisfied. Madame Loisel laments,

I'm upset that I have no jewels, not a single stone to wear. I will look cheap. I would almost rather not go to the party.

Like a spoiled child, she cannot be satisfied by or appreciate what she already has; the expensive dress is not enough for her. Without jewels to adorn her appearance further, she fears looking “cheap.” Again, her social insecurity rears its ugly head; “cheap” implies not only a lack of money but also a lack of respect. Madame Loisel believes that she is elegant and deserves such recognition from others.

Fourth, she rejects her husband’s suggestion that she don flowers instead of jewelry with

No; there is nothing more humiliating than looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich women.

She condescendingly views flowers—understated and natural—as poor substitutes to flashy (and, as she learns at the end, fake) jewels. Madame Loisel’s feeling of humiliation (created by her contrast to wealthier women at the party) demonstrates her insecurity and lack of confidence in her real identity.

There is certainly plenty of evidence to show Madame Loisel's dissatisfaction with her lot in life! You might want to start out by examining the beginning of this story and the way that she is presented. Consider, for example, the way that she is shown to "grieve incessantly":

She grieved over the shabbiness of her appartment, the dinginess of the walls, the worn-out appearance of the chairs, the ugliness of the draperies. All these things, which another woman of her class would not even have noticed, gnawed at her and made her furious.

It is clear from the way that the narrator tells us that "another woman of her class" would not even have noticed such things that Madame Loisel is profoundly dissatisfied with her position in life.

In addition, you could use any of the lavish daydreams that fill her day at the beginning of the story to indicate that she is ungrateful. She clearly does not value what she has, otherwise she would not invest so many hours in fabricating fantasies. Consider, too, her response after visiting her friend who has done much better in life:

She had a well-to-do friend, a classmate of convent-school days whom she would no longer go to see, simply because she would feel so distressed on returnign home. And she would weep for days on end from vexation, regret, despair and anguish.

Such an emotive response is rather hyperbolic, again reinforcing the profound ungratefulness of Madame Loisel's character. She is very comfortable in life, but her desire for greater wealth and prestige means that she is blind to how lucky she is.

In Guy de Maupassant's short story "The Necklace," Madame Loisel is ungrateful because she is never satisfied with what she has. She is forever wishing for a more, believing she has been shortchanged by life. She never shows appreciation for what she has, including a hard-working husband who tries his best to make her happy.

While Madame Loisel is a pretty young woman, she was born into a family without money or connections. Without a dowry or prospects...

...she let herself be married to a little clerk of the Ministry of Public Instruction.

Even this reference makes her seem ungrateful, as if despite a similar position in society, she allows herself to marry beneath the station she feels entitled to. During this time period, it is more socially acceptable to be married than be a spinster. This is one way in which she should be pleased with her life. However, she acts as if she "had fallen from a higher station."  

Mathilde suffered ceaselessly, feeling herself born to enjoy all the delicacies and luxuries others enjoyed.

She is obsessed with the lifestyle she wishes she had— the parties she dreams of attending and the food and flattery accompanying such occasions:

...she thought of dainty dinners, of shining silverware, of tapestry that peopled the walls with ancient personages and with strange birds flying in the midst of a fairy forest; and she thought of delicious dishes served on marvellous plates and of the whispered gallantries to which you listen with a sphinxlike smile while you are eating the pink meat of a trout or the wings of a quail.

This is a young woman who is not satisfied with her lot in life. She is an egocentric person who wants to be sought after and thought to be charming. She is only interested in herself.

Madame Loisel's husband comes home one evening with a surprise. It is obvious that he is aware of her overall displeasure with everything about her life, even though he cares a great deal for her and does his best to provide for her. On this occasion, he has been able, not without difficulty, to procure for them a coveted invitation to a special ball. 

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?"

The story mentions that in thinking about how much a suitable gown would cost, such an amount would elicit a "frightened response" from her husband. We can infer by this that he does not make a great deal of money and such a cost would bring to his mind how easily one could become destitute. He is distracted by her weeping. He reacts to her behavior with "despair." It is clear that her husband wants to bring her joy, but she has no thought of anything but her own desires.

In the face of a man who works hard to make a comfortable life for his wife, it is hard to see Madame Loisel as anything but ungrateful. While he wants to do things that will delight his wife, she acts like a spoiled child, showing neither appreciation for her husband's concerns for her nor thankfulness for his heartfelt wish to please her.

Guy de Maupassant’s intriguing story “The Necklace” features an unusual protagonist.  Mathilde Loisel could also serve as the antagonist in the story since she is her own worst enemy. 

Mathilde has a home, a servant, and her wonderful husband.  Her parents were poor.  She entered her marriage without a dowry [which was unusual for the times].  These are things for which she should have been grateful to her husband.

Mathilde’s personal characteristics were not admirable.  She was pretty on the outside, but what was inside Mathilde was somewhat despicable. She was not satisfied with any part of her life.  Her determination of success was entirely materialistic. 

• She dressed plainly.
• She wanted luxuries that her husband could not afford.
• She was angry all of the time because she felt that she deserved more.
• She wanted to be sought after.
• She did not appreciate her husband.

Quotations illustrating Mathilde Loisel’s materialism

(1) “The sight of the little Breton peasant, who did her humble housework aroused in her regrets which were despairing, and distracted dreams.”

Coming from a family of clerks, it is doubtful that she grew up with servants to wait on her.  Her husband is also a clerk.  It is surprising that they can afford to have a servant at all.  At least, she has a servant.  How ungrateful!  Mathilde is even uncomplimentary toward her servant.  The lady must have been from a farm in Brittany.  Mathilde does not deserve to have someone who does her work for her because she does not appreciate it.

(2) “The day of the ball drew near, and Mme. Loisel seems sad, uneasy and anxious.”

“What is the matter? Come, you’ve been so queer these last three days.”

“It annoys me not to have a single jewel, not a single stone, nothing to put on.  I should almost rather not go at all.”

When the husband brought home the invitation to the ball, he was so excited because he thought it would please her.  She immaturely told him to give it to someone else that had a dress to wear.  To please her, he gives her the four hundred francs that he had been saving to buy a gun. 

Mathilde buys her dress, yet she is still unhappy because she has no jewels to wear. Every suggestion that the husband makes is rejected.  Finally, he reminds Mathilde of her friend who has a lot of jewelry. 

Nothing seems to be good enough for Mathilde.  Her husband is quite a man to put up with her foolish attitudes. 

(3)  Her husband threw over her shoulders the wraps which he had brought whose poverty contrasted with the elegance of the ball dress.  She wanted to escape so as not to be remarked by the other women, who were enveloping themselves in costly furs.

Mathilde had a great time at the ball.  Her dress was beautiful, and she was admired by everyone.  When it is time to go home, her husband has been waiting for her in the coat room.  He places the wrap around her to keep her warm;  however, she is embarrassed by it because the other ladies were putting on furs.  Rather than wait on her husband to get a cab, she runs out of the building so that no one will see her coat. 

This is the time that she discovers that she has lost the necklace. After this, life is not easy for Mathilde.  She has to face up to her responsibilities, and she does grow and change.  If Mathilde had not been so unhappy, possibly none of the pathetic things that happened to her after the necklace is lost would have occurred.

In this story, Mathilde becomes obsessed with her appearance after she and her husband are invited to an elegant party. She spends a large sum of money on a dress, and then she borrows a diamond necklace from a friend. This proves to be their ruin. On the way home from the party she loses the necklace, and rather than suffer the disgrace of admitting this to her friend, her husband spends all the money they have and takes out loans so they can buy a replacement. After that they live in poverty, working hard for 10 years to pay back their debts. In the end, Mathilde finds out that the necklace she had borrowed was an imitation, worth only a fraction of what she had paid to replace it.

Certainly, Mathilde's materialistic attitude is responsible for their downfall. However, even before de Maupassant tells of the party and its aftermath, there is a short introduction that makes Mathilde's materialism clear. The author writes that she is unhappy with her simple lifestyle because she feels that she was "born for every delicacy and luxury." She is dissatisfied with "the poorness of her house," and she imagines more elaborate and luxurious surroundings. She laments that she has "no clothes, no jewels, nothing":

And these were the only things she loved; she felt that she was made for them.

These are some of the quotes from the description of Mathilde's character at the beginning that you could use in your paragraph. After she finds out about the party, of course, her materialistic attitude becomes starkly evident. She proclaims that she has nothing to wear, although her husband points out that she has a nice dress that she wears to the theater. She demands a large sum of money with which to buy a new dress. Even after she buys a new dress with the money her husband was planning to use to buy a new gun, she whines that she is "utterly miserable at not having any jewels, not a single stone, to wear." She insists that "there's nothing so humiliating as looking poor in the middle of a lot of rich women."

We see, then, that de Maupassant gives many indications throughout the story that emphasize how materialistic Mathilde is.