The Necklace: Types of Characters, Comparing Characters, and Values Shown through Actions

40 min

Let's begin

Readers judge characters the way we judge people: not by what they say about themselves, but by what they do, especially when they are under pressure. In this lesson you meet one of the most famous characters in the short story, Mathilde Loisel, created by the French writer Guy de Maupassant in 1884. You will classify the characters of her story by type, compare them with each other and with characters from earlier lessons, and trace how their actions reveal their values.

The story: The Necklace

Guy de Maupassant, 1884. Summarised by Ganzaa; the quotations in italics are from the public-domain English translation in the Project Gutenberg collection (see the credits), where the story is called "The Diamond Necklace".

1 Mathilde is a pretty young woman in Paris, married to Monsieur Loisel, a junior clerk at the Ministry of Public Instruction. They are not poor, but she is miserable: she dreams of fine dresses, elegant rooms and admiring guests, and feels that her small flat and plain clothes are an injustice. Her husband, by contrast, is happy with a simple dinner of soup.

2 One evening he comes home proudly with an invitation to a grand ball at the Ministry. Instead of being pleased, she weeps: she has nothing to wear. Loisel has saved four hundred francs to buy a gun and go shooting with friends next summer; he gives the money to her for a dress. Then she grieves that she has no jewels, and he suggests she borrow some from her rich school friend, Madame Forestier, who lends her a magnificent diamond necklace.

3 At the ball Mathilde is the most admired woman in the room. But at home, at four in the morning, she discovers that the necklace is gone. Loisel searches the streets all night and all the next day. Then he makes a decision: she must write to her friend that the clasp is broken and is being mended, to "give us time to turn round". After a week, with no hope left, they buy a replacement in a shop at the Palais Royal for thirty-six thousand francs, borrowing at ruinous interest. Madame Forestier takes it back without even opening the case.

4 For ten years the Loisels pay off the debt. They dismiss their servant and move to an attic. Mathilde does the heavy housework herself and bargains in the market over every coin; her husband works in the evenings and copies documents at night. At the end of ten years Mathilde has become "strong and hard and rough", and she looks old.

5 One Sunday she meets Madame Forestier, still young and beautiful, and, now that the debt is paid, tells her the whole story with pride. Her friend, deeply moved, takes her hands: "Oh, my poor Mathilde! Why, my necklace was paste! It was worth at most only five hundred francs!"

paste: imitation jewellery made of glass; attic: a room under the roof of a building, usually the cheapest to rent; sou: an old French coin of very small value.

Definition

Types of characters

protagonist (n): the main character, whose goals and struggles drive the story. antagonist (n): the character or force that opposes the protagonist; it may be a person, society, nature or the protagonist's own flaw.
major / minor character: a major character is central to the plot; a minor one has a small, supporting part.
round character: complex, with several traits, sometimes contradictory, who can surprise us. flat character: simple, built around one or two traits.
dynamic character: changes in an important way. static character: stays the same.
foil (n): a character whose contrast with another character highlights that character's qualities.
stock character (n): a familiar type the audience recognises at once, such as the clever hare or the wicked stepmother.
characterisation (n): the methods a writer uses to reveal character: direct (the narrator tells us) or indirect (we infer from actions, speech, thoughts and others' reactions).

Classifying the characters

Character	Type	Evidence
Mathilde Loisel	protagonist; major; round; dynamic	vain and dissatisfied, yet brave and hard-working when disaster comes; changes from a dreamer into a woman "strong and hard and rough"
Monsieur Loisel	major; mostly flat; static; foil to Mathilde	content with soup, generous with his savings, loyal throughout; his simple satisfaction shows up her discontent
Madame Forestier	minor; flat; static	rich, kind, a little careless; she sets the plot moving and delivers the twist
The antagonist	not a person	Mathilde's own vanity and pride, and a society that judges women by appearance

Values shown through actions

Action	Who	Value revealed	Comment
Gives up his gun money for her dress	Loisel	generosity, self-sacrifice	a small loss accepted quietly for her happiness
Writes that the clasp is broken	both (Loisel proposes it)	dishonesty, fear of shame	the turning point: one lie closes the door on the truth
Replace the necklace and repay every franc	both	responsibility, endurance	they keep their word to their creditors at enormous cost
Does the heaviest work herself for ten years	Mathilde	courage, perseverance	"She bore her part, however, with sudden heroism", says the translation; the vain girl becomes strong
Tells her friend the truth at last, "with pride"	Mathilde	honesty, but also pride	the honesty that would have saved them comes ten years too late

The story's moral is not stated, but the actions make it clear: a single dishonest choice, made to avoid shame, cost ten years that one honest sentence would have saved. Maupassant's narrator asks: "How small a thing is needed to make or ruin us!"

Worked example

Comparing two characters: Mathilde and Pahom (Lesson 2)

Point of comparison	Mathilde	Pahom
What they want	luxury and admiration	more land
Key flaw	vanity and fear of shame	greed
Type	round, dynamic	dynamic (from content to greedy)
Direction of change	from idle dreamer to hard-working, strong woman	from content farmer to self-destructive
Ending	survives, but learns the truth too late	dies at the moment of "success"

Model paragraph: Both Mathilde and Pahom are dynamic characters whose desire for more leads to disaster, but they change in opposite directions. Pahom's greed grows with each gain until it kills him. Mathilde's vanity, by contrast, is burnt away by ten years of labour: the woman who wept over a dress learns to scrub floors and bargain in the market, "defending her miserable money, sou by sou". Pahom ends with nothing but a grave; Mathilde ends stronger, though the twist shows that her suffering was unnecessary. Tolstoy warns against wanting too much; Maupassant warns against hiding the truth.

Notice: organise a comparison by point (desire, flaw, change, ending), not one character after the other; use linking words of comparison (both, but, by contrast, whereas).

Tip

Round or flat? Ask, "Could this character surprise me?" If a character can only ever behave one way (Loisel will always be kind), he is flat. If a character can do something unexpected and still be believable (vain Mathilde working heroically for ten years), she is round.

Warning

Flat does not mean badly written, and the antagonist need not be a villain. Flat characters are often essential: Loisel's steady kindness is what makes Mathilde's discontent visible. And in "The Necklace" the main opposing force is inside Mathilde herself. Don't hunt for a villain where there is none.

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Practice

Classify each character as round or flat, and dynamic or static: (a) Keza ("The First Calf"); (b) Byiringiro ("The First Calf"); (c) Mugisha ("The Wrong Number"); (d) Kalisa ("The Wrong Number").
Who or what is the antagonist in (a) "The Robin-Chat Who Heard Wrong"; (b) "How Much Land Does a Man Need?"
Explain how Monsieur Loisel acts as a foil to Mathilde. Give two details.
Find one example of direct and one of indirect characterisation in the summary of "The Necklace".
Which single action in "The Necklace" do you consider the moral turning point? Justify your choice in 60–80 words.
Write a comparison paragraph (100–120 words), organised by point, of Mugisha (Lesson 1) and the Loisels: how does each respond to the temptation to hide the truth?

Show answersHide answers

(a) round, dynamic (she moves from wanting to keep the calf to giving it) (b) flat, static (c) round, dynamic in one key moment (tempted, then honest) (d) round, dynamic (from mocking to confessing). Accept reasoned alternatives.
(a) The robin-chat's own haste, not another character. (b) Pahom's own greed (in Tolstoy's frame, the Devil who tempts him).
He is content where she is dissatisfied (happy with soup while she dreams of feasts), and generous where she is self-centred (he gives up his gun money for her dress). The contrast makes her vanity clearer.
Direct: "she is miserable" or "Her husband … is happy with a simple dinner of soup". Indirect: she weeps at the invitation because she has nothing to wear (we infer her vanity from her action).
Model: The letter claiming that the clasp is broken. Until then, the loss was an accident; the letter turns it into a lie told to avoid shame. Once it was sent, confessing became harder each day, and the debt followed. One honest sentence at that moment would have revealed that the necklace was paste and saved ten years.
Model: Both Mugisha and the Loisels face a moment when the truth would cost them something. Mugisha could keep money that was not his; the Loisels could avoid an embarrassing confession. Mugisha chooses the truth at once and loses only an imagined laptop. The Loisels, by contrast, choose silence, and their silence costs ten years of hard labour. Both stories therefore reward honesty, but in opposite ways: one shows its immediate rewards, the other the long price of its absence.

Quick check

Match each character in The Necklace to the best description.

Tap one on the left, then its partner on the right.

Key points

Classify characters in pairs of types: protagonist or antagonist; major or minor; round or flat; dynamic or static; and look for foils and stock types.
The antagonist may be a force, such as a character's own flaw.
Actions reveal values: in "The Necklace" one lie told to avoid shame costs ten years.
Compare characters point by point, with linking words of comparison and brief quotations.

Sources and credits

Summary of "The Necklace", tables, comparison, questions and practice written by Ganzaa.
Original story: Guy de Maupassant, "La Parure", 1884. Quotations from "The Diamond Necklace" in Complete Original Short Stories of Guy de Maupassant, translated by A. E. Henderson, Albert Cohn McMaster and Louise Charlotte Garstin Quesada, Project Gutenberg; public domain.
Photo: Guy de Maupassant, Nadar, 1888, Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

1The story: The Necklace

2Classifying the characters

3Values shown through actions

The story: The Necklace

Classifying the characters

Values shown through actions