175), she certainly spoke of ideology, not practice. When a German historian said the women’s rights movement was “the child of the revolution of 1789” (Schirmacher, p. He became famous for his casual sexual relationships, and eventually died of syphilis, a common sexually transmitted disease in the nineteenth century.
In de Maupassant’s opinion, the female should strive to be a charming and an eye-pleasing ornament for the pleasure of male existence.ĭe Maupassant’s lifestyle reflected his dismissive view of women. Anything other than vain and shallow pretensions would meet with disapproval.
It is not surprising, then, that the main character in “The Necklace” hesitates to be seen in plain clothing. Women with limited financial resources found it much more difficult to attain the level of appearance expected in French society. These glib opinions, which were published in French journals, reflect a type of scrutiny applied to women that put the less wealthy, such as Madame Loisel in “The Necklace,” at a disadvantage. He approvingly kissed the rosy fingertips of ladies who aimed, above all, to be beautiful and seductive. With no effort to hide his scorn, the author suggested that men recognize only one right in women: the right to please. Moreover, he sarcastically dismissed the women’s rights movement as nothing more than an uprising of skirts. He scoffed at monogamy, insisting that he could not understand how two women could not be better than one, three better than two, and ten better than three. He recommended that the French Academy commission a treatise on how to “break decently, properly, politely, without noise, scene or violence, with a woman who adores you and with whom you are fed up” (de Maupassant in Steegmuller, p. He was also, however, devastatingly cruel to women, whether in his own life or in his fiction. He was one of few nineteenth-century authors to recognize and celebrate women’s sensuality rather than regard it as a sign of corruption. It certainly influenced his own attitude toward women, which, in turn, affected his creation of characters in stories such as “The Necklace.” Events in History at the Time of the Short Story The purpose of womenĭe Maupassant’s attitude toward women was ambivalent.
Perhaps the collapse of his parents’ marriage engendered de Maupassant’s pessimism, reflected particularly in his stories about infidelity and failed relationships. His mother has been described as neurotic and his father as a man who sought relief from his wife in the arms of other women. Guy de Maupassant was the child of an unhappy marriage. A short story set in France in about 1885 published in 1885.Ī young woman wastes away her youth working to replace a lost diamond necklace, only to discover that the necklace was a fake.Įvents in History at the Time of the Short Story
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