Journal 1/19/10

An example of one of the three short stories my class read for Language Arts that reflects the Man VS Himself theme is the story "The Necklace." In "The Necklace," a woman named Mathilde is very egotistical and envies the rich. Her kind and selfless husband makes a nice gestire to Mathilde and gets her a very rare ball invitation. She makes him buy her an expensive gown, then demands jewels. She ends up borrowing some jewelry from a very high-class friend of hers. She attended the ball with the diamond necklace she had borrowed and lost it after the ball. She and her husband purchased a similar one, which caused them to live in poverty for ten years. Later, the rich lady told her that the necklace she had borrowed was worth far less then the one she and her spouse had replaced it with. Then Mathilde blamed her misfortune on the rich lady! This is clearly themed with Man VS Himself. If Mathilde had not been so egotistical and jelous, she wouldn't have dug herself in this hole. It was a terrible fate.