THE NECKLACE by Guy de Maupassant

          This story really impress me when I first start to read it. At the beginning of the story, essentially nothing happens. The narrator's interested in telling us about Mathilde (even though we don't yet know her name). We learn about her back-story, her character, and her unhappiness with her mediocre life. This represents a classic initial situation.

          The flow of the conflict action begins properly when M. Loisel (Mathilde's husband) comes home with the invitation to the fabulous ball and Mathilde reacts by having a fit. Through the reading I found a specific problem. Mathilde's now has the best opportunity she's ever had to have a taste of the high life, but she has nothing to wear. That problem sets the rest of the plot in motion.

           Complication begins when Mathilde solves the first problem with her husband when he gives her money for a dress. But then she runs into a second problem. She needs to have some jewels. Luckily, her friend Mme. Forestier is able to provide her with a fabulous diamond necklace. But now Mathilde's been entrusted with something expensive that belongs to someone else and we have the potential for disaster. It's true that the complication is often happen when things "get worse," and that doesn't really happen here (for that, we have to wait for the climax). In fact, after borrowing the necklace, Mathilde has the time of her life. But it's when she borrows the necklace. The possibility opens up for something really bad to happen…and it does.

          For the climax, Mathilde's discovery is the most exciting and dramatic moment in the story (until that crazy twist in the last line). It's also the turning point in the plot. Before, the story was a build-up to Mathilde's one glorious night with the rich and famous. Now, it transit into a desperate search. I had a feeling that things are not going to end well.

          The suspense occur after the loss of the necklace. I was kept in constant suspense. First, there's the search for the necklace. A lot of questions appear into my mind.(Will it be found? When it becomes clear it isn't going to be what will the Loisels do? Will they find a replacement? And when they do, how the are they going to pay for it?) It turns out paying for it takes quite a toll on them and their lives are ruined for ten years.

          During the denouement, when Mathilde meets Mme. Forestier on the Champs Elysées, it looks like I'm just about to tie up the last loose end in the story. The main action is over when the Loisels have finally finished paying off their debts for the necklace. All that remains is for Mathilde to see whether her friend ever noticed the substitute necklace, and tell her the sad story of the whole affair. But then things don't quite wrap up the way we expect.

          The twist ending is the climax of the story. I thought that the twist is the most exciting moment of the story, and represents a turning point since it reverses everything that came before. A climax is technically the point of the plot that everything builds up to, and that's not true of the twist. What makes the twist so effective is that by the time it happens the plot has already "risen and fallen," and seems to be wrapping up naturally. Then, right in the denouement, everything changes.
          So, I found the difference in the ending of the story and it really will be useful in the classroom teaching for the students in order to teach the various style of writing the climax in stories.

DIARIES

THE ANDY WARHOL DIARIES by Pat Hackett

Extract from Andy Warhol Diaries

  

Tuesday, September 20, 1977

‘Watched Stanley Siegel. Brooke Shields didn’t show up so he did a live telephone interview with Sophia Loren, who’s in town at the Pierre. Her English is good now. But you know, seeing her on TV this morning, she’s just … trashy. She said she wouldn’t let her daughter be in a movie like Brooke Shield’s Pretty Baby, and I mean didn’t she just fuck her way to the top? Who’s she kidding? She’s so pretentious. I’m supposed to see her on Thursday.’

Thursday, January 5, 1978

‘Bianca [Jagger] had two blemishes on her face! She’s never had a blemish! I guess she’s depressed about Mick [Jagger], discoing the night away. She stays out until 6 and then gets up for her 8am exercise class.’

Sunday, March 19, 1978

‘Dali is so full of ideas, and he’s ahead in some things, but then he’s behind in others. It’s odd. He was telling me about a book that’s just been written in Paris about a brother and sister who were so in love that the brother (laughs) ate her shit.’

Sunday, March 26, 1978‘And Nelson called me from LA. He said that he’d been in the hospital because on St Patrick’s Day he and Bobby De Niro started eating a five-pound cheddar cheese with Jack Daniel’s and day by day that’s all Nelson was eating until finally he had pains and he went to the hospital and they said that the cheese had turned to rock and they gave him a laxative to break it up.’

Saturday, April 8, 1978

‘Mick wanted us to hear his new record, and we were going to bring it over to Studio 54 but it was at Earl McGrath’s house, so we went over there ($4). Jann and Jane Wenner were there and Stephen Graham who had something wrapped in foil in his pocket. It looked like drugs, but it turned out to be a Rice Crispie cookie.’

Sunday, April 16, 1978‘The gossip from Saturday night at Studio 54 before was that Jack Nicholson came in and Ryan O’Neal was there with Barbara Allen and everyone was trying to keep Jack and Ryan apart so they wouldn’t see each other. Barbara thought it was because of her, but it was the situation with Anjelica [Huston] – she’s been seeing Ryan lately. And Stevie called and said how hard he worked, that it was so much fun keeping them apart. And Tatum was dancing with Mona Christiansen. And Stevie said that Liza was dying for Marty Scorsese to get back to town, because [Mikhail] Baryshnikov just sees too many girls.’

Thursday, May 11, 1978
‘When we got to 54 Stevie said he’d just driven Bianca [Jagger] to the airport. He said he’s so in love with her, and that if he weren’t gay he’d really fall for her, but he just couldn’t get it up.’

Monday, May 29, 1978‘We walked over to have lunch at One Fifth, and on the way we saw Patti Smith in a bowler hat buying food for her cat. I invited her thinking she’d say no, but she said, “Great” … Patti didn’t want to eat too much, so she ate half my lunch. She said she only loves blonds and that she wanted to have an affair with a blond. All I could think about was her b.o.’

As what I gather, Andy Warhol kept these diaries faithfully from November 1976 right up to his final week, in February 1987. Written at the height of his fame and success, Warhol records the fun of an Academy Awards party, nights out at Studio 54, trips between London, Paris and New York, and surprisingly even the money he spent each day, down to the cent. With appearances from and references to everyone who was anyone, from Jim Morrison, Martina Navratilova and Calvin Klein to Shirley Bassey, Estee Lauder and Muhammad Ali, these diaries are the most glamorous, witty and revealing writings of the twentieth century.

LETTER BY FAMOUS PEOPLE

Letter of John Keats To Fanny Brawne, 19 October 1819

Recipient:  Fanny Brawne (1800-1865) was first Keats's neighbor and later his fiancée.  The eldest child of a widowed mother, she at first perplexed and exasperated the poet.  They fell in love, though Keats's friends were against the match.

Introduction:  Keats's letters to Fanny Brawne are among the most famous love letters ever written.  As next door neighbors, they exchanged numerous short notes, and occasionally more passionate ones.  None of Fanny's letters to Keats survive.  From his, however, it seems he was often unsettled by her behavior and uncertain of her affection.  His illness brought them closer; when he left for Rome, they were engaged and deeply in love.

Great Smith Street
Tuesday Morn -

My sweet Fanny,

On awakening from my three days dream ("I cry to dream again") I find one and another astonish'd at my idleness and thoughtlessness - I was miserable last night - the morning is always restorative - I must be busy, or try to be so.  I  have several things to speak to you of tomorrow morning.  Mrs Dilke I should think will tell you that I purpose living at Hampstead - I must impose chains upon myself - I shall be able to do nothing - I sho[ u ]ld like to cast the die for Love or death - I have no Patience with any thing else - if you ever intend to be cruel to me as you say in jest now but perhaps may sometimes be in earnest be so now  and I will - my mind is in a tremble, I cannot tell what I am writing.

Ever my love yours

John Keats

_________________________________

Notes:  Keats quotes from Shakespeare's The Tempest.

In my opinion, I really appreciate John Keats because he really express his true love to Fanny Brown by using quotes from Shakespeare's The Tempest. I learned alot on how to write letters to our loved ones not only my future Mr. Right but also for my parents. For him, poetry had once more become a consuming passion.  But it would only be a matter of time before both Fanny and poetry occupied positions of equal importance in his life

Fanny was no poet, nor did she aspire to the title.  But as their acquaintance grew and deepened, she developed a keen appreciation and respect for Keats's work.  

Whether she enjoyed it because it was written by the young man she loved, or because she recognized its greatness, I do not know; but her encouragement.

MARGINALISED LITERATURE – FEMINIST WRITINGS

PRIDE AND PREJUDICE by Jane Austen

          One of the world's most popular novels, Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice has delighted readers since its publication with the story of the witty Elizabeth Bennet and her relationship with the aristocrat Fitzwilliam Darcy. Similar to Austen's other works, Pride and Prejudice is a humorous portrayal of the social atmosphere of late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century England, and it is principally concerned with courtship rituals of the English gentry. The novel is much more than a comedic love story, however through Austen's subtle and ironic style, it addresses economic, political, feminist, sociological, and philosophical themes, inspiring a great deal of diverse critical commentary on the meaning of the work.

          Jane Austen, the author of Pride and Prejudice, holds feminist views and uses the novel to show her opinions about women’s issues. Pride and Prejudice is a personal essay, a statement of Jane Austen’s feelings about the perfect lady, marriage, and the relationship between the sexes. Jane Austen’s characters, plot, and dialogue are biased to reflect her beliefs. The biased process and importance of marriage are introduced with the first line of the novel. Jane Austen writes, it is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife. However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering the neighborhood, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding families that he is considered as the rightful property of some one or other of their daughters.

          This implies that the man wants a wife and the woman is not in a place to turn him down. The man becomes her claim, and for him she fights with other women. It seems as if women are plentiful and men are rare. The man has freedom and the option to choose any girl that he wants, while the women are desperate and fight for whichever man they can get. Jane Austen points this out and shows how dependent the woman is on a man in her English society. This dependence is viewed as a necessary part of upper class England by most and was not criticized. If Jane Austen had written a book simply about English society, these sentiments would not have showed up. The fact that they are introduced and expressed again and again in Pride and Prejudice means that Jane Austen held feminist ideals and expressed them in this piece of writing.