Necklace Characters Essay, Research Paper

Mathlide Loisel is a character who has much pride in her. It is her motivation

to act throughout the story, and it is the key to her downfall. Mathlide

downfall comes into place when she does not tell Mrs. Forrestier that she lost

her necklace. Mathlide does not gush out confessions and prostrating herself

while pleading for forgiveness, she takes the responsibility for her mistakes by

replacing Mrs. Forrestier?s necklace. De Maupassant shows her qualities in the

introduction, the incident, and the poverty she endures. At the beginning of the

story Mathlide pride is so strong that she does not want to face reality.

Reality meaning the husband she has and the small household she resumes in. So

in order to reject reality she turns to her dreams in which she has the life of

ease and riches. Pride comes to place when she is complaining to her husband

about the way hey live and how she deserves more than this. When they discover

that they have been invited to a big party, she feels she must live up to her

pride. Knowing without a doubt that they have no money, she wants to have a

beautiful dress and along with the dress she gets a radiant necklace from Mrs.

Forrestier. The incident in which Mathlide loses the necklace plays an active

role in Mathlide?s pride. Mathlide refuses to endure embarrassment by telling

Mrs. Forrestier that she lost her necklace, so she goes and replaces the

necklace. Her pride will not let her stoop so low into apologizing, pleading for

forgiveness for nothing, instead her pride tells her that she is capable of

replacing the necklace, and so she does. Her pride dreadfully leads her into

destitution lifestyle, something she is not most proud of. The reality of her

life becomes more realistic than ever. She is plunged into poverty, and drudgery

that will take away her prized youth and beauty, never to return, but yet she

still has her pride. At the end after all the debts are all paid, she sees Mrs.

Forrestier, who by the way does not recognize her, tells her about the incident

and what she had to do to pay the money, and discovers that the necklace was

nothing more than a fake. Mathlide is a character who has a pride so strong that

she doesn?t notice until her pride hits her with retribution, by leading her

to poverty. She sees her responsibility for losing the necklace, and she had

enough sense of self-sacrifice to pay for restoring it. She sacrifices ?with

pride? not only her position, but also her youth and beauty. Pride plays a

crucial role in Mathlide life, role that stands strong and proud, but yet its so

crucial that it drives Mathlides fate.