Revision Summary: The Necklace (Footprints without Feet, Class 10)
1. Unit at a glance
- Contains one prose story, “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant; no poem is included in the unit.
- Central character: Mme Matilda Loisel, a clerk’s wife dissatisfied with her modest life.
- Plot driven by the loss of a borrowed necklace and its ten-year consequences.
- Theme revolves around appearance versus reality and the price of vanity.
- Story uses irony to show how a single night changes the Loisels’ entire future.
- Ends with the revelation that the lost necklace was fake, highlighting the futility of the couple’s suffering.
2. Prose
Summary
Matilda Loisel, born into a family of clerks, feels she deserves luxury. Her husband secures an invitation to a grand ministerial ball. Unhappy without jewellery, she borrows a diamond necklace from her friend Mme Forestier. After the ball she loses it. The Loisels replace it with a 36,000-franc necklace bought on credit. They spend ten years in poverty repaying the debt. When Matilda finally tells Mme Forestier the truth, she learns the original necklace was worth only 500 francs.
Setting
Late 19th-century Paris: modest clerk’s apartment, the Minister’s ball, streets at night, later an attic room.
Main characters
- Mme Matilda Loisel: pretty woman who feels born for luxury and is unhappy with her simple life.
- M. Loisel: petty clerk who is content with modest pleasures and tries to please his wife.
- Mme Jeanne Forestier: Matilda’s rich school friend who lends her the necklace.
Sequence of key events
- M. Loisel brings home the ball invitation; Matilda is unhappy because she has no suitable dress or jewels.
- M. Loisel gives her 400 francs for a dress; she borrows a diamond necklace from Mme Forestier.
- Matilda enjoys great success at the ball but loses the necklace on the way home.
- After frantic search, the couple buys an identical necklace for 36,000 francs on credit.
- They live in poverty for ten years repaying the loans.
- Matilda meets Mme Forestier and reveals the truth; learns the original necklace was false.
3. Poem
This unit contains only the prose piece; no poem is present.
4. Themes and messages
The writer shows that excessive desire for social status and appearance can destroy years of life. Matilda’s refusal to accept her situation leads to needless suffering. The final line reveals the necklace “were not worth over five hundred francs,” underlining how a small thing can ruin or save one.
5. Literary devices
- Irony: “Mine were false. They were not worth over five hundred francs!”
- Imagery: “shabby walls and the worn chairs”; “rich furs”
- Personification: “poverty clashed with the elegance of the ball costume”
- Contrast: “elegant dinners, of shining silver” versus “odious work of a kitchen”
6. Vocabulary
- incessantly: continuously
- tureen: covered dish for serving soup
- vexation: distress or annoyance
- ruinous: causing financial disaster
- usurers: moneylenders charging high interest
- sou: old French coin of low value
- awry: twisted or out of place
7. Exam pitfalls
- Confusing the original necklace with the replacement (students often say they bought a real one when it was fake).
- Stating the Loisels repaid the exact amount without noting they borrowed at high interest.
- Claiming Matilda confessed immediately instead of after ten years.
- Forgetting that M. Loisel suggested borrowing from Mme Forestier.