If there was
a chart of the progress of the plot with the symbols/themes, it would look like
this:
Matilda is
unhappy because she believes that she is too beautiful to be in rags (This
means that there will be a rich versus the poor theme).
The husband
expects her to be happy to go to a lavish party, but the exact opposite
happens. Matilda is unhappy because she
does not have a fancy dress and jewels to wear among the rich women (Matilda believes that the only way she can ever be happy is to have fancy materialistic
things).
The husband
gives her money that he saved for himself to his wife so she could buy a fancy
dress. Matilda is still not satisfied,
so she borrows a necklace from her friend (Matilda does not appreciate her
husband’s gift and presses further because greed is coming in).
When she
goes to the party, she feels like she is the life and queen of the party. When her husband puts a wrap around her,
because he cares for her well-being, she runs away because she would look bad with
it. All the rich ladies have fancy
shawls (This scene shows through the images of a lavish party and the sounds of
music that this was what Matilda was hoping for. She believes that someone as beautiful as her
should deserve this type of lifestyle. This is where the theme of beauty makes a
powerful entrance).
Along the run, she loses the necklace and
writes to her friend that she will give it back to her after fixing a clasp
that broke from it (She loses the very thing that made her beautiful).
Matilda and
her husband spent a fortune on buying a new diamond necklace after they found
one like it. They had to work hard for
ten years to pay off the debt (Here, through the descriptive narration, it is
shown that Matilda has worked hard for ten years. This is a parallel to what society must
learn. Money does not come easily. Hard work is involved).
After the
ten years, Matilda became the opposite of a beautiful woman and was crude. Her friend, when she ran into her, was still
beautiful and young. She even had a
child. Matilda told her friend the true
story, only to find out that the necklace was a fake.
The ending
of the narrative symbolizes that Matilda’s thirst for materialistic objects
made her the exact opposite of the beautiful women that she once was. Her friend, with the fake diamonds, remained
young and beautiful because she did not care for real diamonds and
materialistic objects. This is the irony
at the end of the story. Since the story
is told in Matilda’s point of view, it gives an insight to why she was feeling
the way she is. The denouement in the
plot is not satisfying, and it does not provide closure to the narrative. The story was sad but hilarious at the same time.
