Comparitve Essay

Comparative Essay

In the two short stories “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant and “The Rocking Horse” by D.H. Lawrence, the authors show that the love for money is the most corruptive love of all. One’s love of money can cause one to hurt what they hold most dear, it can make you forget your love for others, and can cause your loved ones to take desperate measures in order to attain your love. These effects are shown through Hester, the female protagonist in “The Rocking Horse” and through Mathilde, the female protagonist in “The Necklace”.

In the “Rocking horse winner” Hester, a mother of 3 children felt that her children “had been thrust upon her” and that “she could not love them” (Lawrence, pg1). This lack of love caused her children to feel unloved and they could “see this in her eyes” (Lawrence, pg1). Hester and her husband always wanted more money for their “social position which they had to keep up”, created a need and love for money (Lawrence, pg 1). This caused their children to feel that they were not as important to their parents, even though Hester tried to show that she cared for the children, the children knew. Paul, Hester’s oldest child, felt this lack of love the most, as he tried to attain her love through money. Hester’s blind eye to her Paul cause her to lose her son, as he died trying to make money for her mother. Similar to Hester was Mathilde in “The Necklace” who had a desire for “delicacy and luxury” (Maupassant, pg1). She felt she was born “for every delicacy and luxury” and that “she suffered from the poorness of her house, from its mean walls, worn chairs, and ugly curtains”. Mathilde felt as if “she had married beneath her” and she regrets marrying her husband, Loisel, who is a “little clerk in the Ministry of Education” (Maupassant, pg 1). The thing that Mathlide loved and held most dear were clothes, jewels and money as she felt she was “made for them” (Maupassant, pg1). This materialistic love cost her everything, as she had to give up all she had and lose her beauty in order to pay back a necklace which she had borrowed and lost.

In both stories, Hester and Mathilde are blinded by their greed for money and luxurious objects, that they forgot about the people they love and should love. In Lawerence's short story, Hester knew “that at the centre of her heart was a hard little place that could feel no love,no,not for anybody” (Lawrence, pg 1). Hester had shunned her son, causing him to want more attention. Similarly to “The Necklace”, where Bethilde's husband, Loisel, tried to make his wife happy by giving her chance to feel rich, by getting an invitation to a party of high class. Instead Bethilde feels insulted and embrassed, since she does not have a dress or any jewelry to wear to such an event, and this makes Loisel feel “Heart Broken” (Maupassant, pg 2).