"The Necklace"  by Guy de Maupassant was written in the late 1800's. The story discusses the life and struggles of the main character, Mathilde. She feels she belongs to a higher class than the one she was born in to and because of this her husband sacrifices everything he has to make her happy. She has a chance to attend a high class ball but did not have the proper clothing for it so she forces her husband to spend his money on a new dress for the night. She also borrows very expensive looking jewels from a friend to look wealthy like the other guests. By the end of the night, she loses the borrowed jewels and sends her husband to look for them without any success. She replaced the lost necklace with a similar one which turned out to be a lot more expensive than the original. The debt she gains from replacing the necklace forces her to live in actual poverty and work endlessly for ten years. By looking at the irony, setting and symbolism, one can see the themes of vanity and suffering in "The Necklace".

Irony is used to express one of the main themes, which is suffering. Mathilde is born into an average life but wants more than she has; her desperation for wealth leads to even more poverty. One example of her want for more leading to her distress is found towards the beginning of the story, "She suffered ceaselessly, feeling herself born for all the delicacies and all the luxuries. She suffered from the poverty of her dwelling, from the wretched look of the walls, from the worn-out chairs, from the ugliness of the curtains." (Maupassant 33). Mathilde is disgusted by her average life and having to stay home all day is a torture for her. She is constantly reminded of her class just by looking around her house. Towards the end of the story, after she buys a replacement necklace, she has an incredible amount of debt to pay off. This forces her to move to a smaller house and learn what hard work truly is, "She came to know what heavy housework meant and the odious cares of the kitchen. She washed the dishes, using her rosy nails on the greasy pots and pans. She washed dirty linen, the shirts, and the dish-cloths, which she dried upon a line; she carried the slops down to the street every morning, and carried up the water, stopping for breath at every landing." (Maupassant 38). The irony during this part of the story is that Mathilde was a stay at home wife before she lost the necklace, she did not appreciate what she had which led to more suffering. She thought she was miserable and poor before she lost the necklace and she learned her lesson the hard way.

The setting of the story is very important because it feeds into Mathilde's materialistic and vain personality. The story is set in Paris, France which is a very rich and fashion-forward city. At the time this story was written, money made nobility. Mathilde was a woman of the lower-middle class who was surrounded by the rich and this fueled her envy. The emphasis on the setting and her vanity are shown early in the story, "She thought of the long salons fatted up with ancient silk, of the delicate furniture carrying priceless curiosities, and of the coquettish perfumed boudoirs made for talks at five o'clock with intimate friends, with men famous and sought after, whom all women envy and whose attention they all desire." (Maupassant 33). All she wanted were things she could not afford, things of the upper class. It all had to do with her setting, she wanted the pretty and expensive things that only the wealthiest people of France could afford. She did not only want it for herself, but she wanted it to be envied by the less fortunate. She was surrounded by the nicest, most expensive things in the country and that drove her mad with desire. Maupassant shows another example of the influence of setting on Mathilde in the middle part of the story, "No; there's nothing more humiliating than to look poor among women who are rich." (Maupassant 35). Her reference to being surrounded rich women and it's influence on her decision is a clear influence of setting on the theme of vanity. She does not only want to look pretty for herself, but she wants to look pretty to fit in with the rich and to feel proud around them. 

The third and final literary device used to express the themes of suffering and vanity is symbolism. The two symbols used in the story are the necklace and the black satin box it was held in. The necklace symbolizes Mathilde's vanity and her desire for things better than what she has. The necklace turned out to be fake which is what she is. She was pretending to be wealthy at the ball and wore the fake necklace to look the part. This influences the theme because at the end of the story Maupassant shows how her pride and vanity drove the conflict of the story, "Oh, my poor Mathilde! Why, my necklace was paste. It was worth at most five hundred francs." (Maupassant 39). Mathilde was embarrassed about losing the necklace so rather than swallowing her pride and telling the truth, she lied and made her life exponentially worse. The second symbolic item in the story is the black satin box the necklace was held in. When Mathilde saw the box she was immediately intrigued,"All of a sudden she discovered, in a black satin box, a superb necklace of diamonds, and her heart began to beat with an immoderate desire." (Maupassant 35). Maupassant is pulling from Greek mythology with the box; the box represents Pandora's box and the temptation to open it. Once Mathilde opens the box chaos ensues, she loses the necklace and works away ten years of her life because she saw that beautiful box and wanted to borrow the necklace. 

The main themes of "The  Necklace" are suffering and vanity. Maupassant reveals that through three literary devices, irony, setting and symbolism. The use of these devices help develop the themes throughout the story and with many different examples. 

