A Necklace as a Symbol: An Intersection between Marxist, Feminist, Psychological, and Formalist Readings of Guy de Maupassant’s “The Necklace” Marine Bruno College

Analytical lenses allow for readers to gain a deeper insight into a literary work, but since there are many, it can be easy to focus on a single lens and miss critical aspects of a story that only another lens would bring to light. Guy de Maupassant’s “The Necklace” is a short story that has depth and can be analyzed at numerous levels to get different meanings out of it, although it is almost impossible to know what Maupassant himself meant for his message to be. In four lenses used in this paper, the necklace within the story highlights the central message, which differs between societal flaws, sexism, and deception.

This paper serves to dive deeper into Maupassant’s “The Necklace” by analyzing it through four different critical lenses to better comprehend specific characteristics, writing elements, and the reasoning behind the substantial usage of the necklace as a symbol. By doing so, one can see the point at which themes and ideas coincide, thus displaying a consistent, robust message no matter the lens used. All four lenses allow for details of the story to be understood on a profound level and emphasize importance. For example, Marxism stresses the characters’ economic backgrounds; feminism highlights the characters’...