All about the author Guy de Maupassant and his writings

1. Guy De Maupassant

2. Henr y-René-Alber t -Guy de
M aupassant , (born August 5, 1850 ,
Chât eau de Miromesnil?, near
Dieppe, France—died July 6, 1893,
Paris), French nat uralist writ er of
short st ories and novels who is by
general agreement t he great est
French short -st ory writ er.

3. He is considered one of the fathers of the modern short story as well as
one of its finest practitioners. His prolific and deeply admired body of
work influenced a great number of writers.
He was a popular writer during his lifetime and had the good fortune to
see that his stories were widely read. As a young man he fought in the
Franco-Prussian War. He drew heavily on that experience and that war
provides the setting for many of his stories which often depict the
tragedy and suffering of innocent civilians caught in war's path.
He also found inspiration in the not-so-admirable behavior of the
bourgeoisie, and made them targets of his biting pessimism and
skewering pen.

4. As a poet, Maupassant made his debut with Des Vers (1880). In the same year, he
published in the anthology Soirées de Medan (1880), edited by E. Zola, his
masterpiece, "Boule De Suif" ("Ball of Fat", 1880). During the 1880s Maupassant
created some 300 short stories, six novels, three travel books, and one volume of
verse. In tone, his tales were marked by objectivity, highly controlled style, and
sometimes sheer comedy. Usually, they were built around simple episodes from
everyday life, which revealed the hidden sides of people. Among Maupassant's
best-known books are Une Vie (A Woman's Life, 1883), about the frustrating
existence of a Norman wife, and Bel-Ami (1885), which depicts an unscrupulous
journalist. Pierre Et Jean (1888) was a psychological study of two brothers.
Maupassant's most upsetting horror story, Le Horla (1887), was about madness
and suicide.

5. Maupassant had suffered from his 20s from syphilis. The disease later
caused increasing mental disorder - also seen in his nightmarish stories,
which have much in common with Edgar Allan Poe's supernatural visions.
Critics have charted Maupassant's developing illness through his semi-
autobiographical stories of abnormal psychology, but the theme of mental
disorder is present even in his first collection, La Maison Tellier (1881),
published at the height of his health.
On January 2, in 1892, Maupassant tried to commit suicide by cutting his
throat and was committed to the celebrated private asylum of Dr. Esprit
Blanche at Passy, in Paris, where he died on July 6, 1893.

6. His most famous work for English readers
The Necklace
A Piece of String
Mademoiselle Fifi
Miss Harriet
My Uncle Jules
Found on a Drowned Man
TheWreck
Gothic Fiction
The Hand.

7. • Boule de Suif is arguably considered Guy de
Maupassant's finest short story. It's a bit long for the
short story form, but its length is justified by
Maupassant's mastery and the treatment of his high
society targets. The story is a withering criticism of the
French society of the late 19th century. Maupassant
takes representatives from the different classes and
stations of French Society and places them all in the
same carriage, which is then accidentally driven behind
enemy lines during the Franco-Prussian war. In time, the
true character of each participant is revealed as
Maupassant passes scathing judgement upon his fellow
countrymen.
• Guy de Maupassant suffered from mental illness in his
later years and attempted suicide on January 2nd, 1892.
He was committed to a private asylum in Paris and died
the following year.

10. SETTING
Paris, France
Loisel’s
apartment, party
at the Ministry of
Education’s
Mansion.
The Necklace

11. CHARACTERS
Madame Loisel - selfish (beautiful, charming, middle class,
spoiled, daydreamed)→→aged quickly, heavy rough,
harsh, shrill voice, poor
Monsieur Loisel - a kind, generous, loyal hard-working,
clerk for the Ministry of Education, wants to please his wife,
middle class.
Madame Forestier - kind, generous, wealthy, snobby

12. POINT OF VIEW
This short story is
told from the 3rd
person limited point
of view. The author
focuses on Madame
Loisel’s thoughts and
feelings.

13. SYMBOLISM
Necklace - greed/desire for what one cannot have,
differences in social classes, dishonesty, Mme. L’s
‘fakeness’ or want of material things.
Dress - M. Loisel sacrifices for his wife.

14. THEME
1. People should be happy
with what they have.
2. Honesty is the best policy.
3. You may pay a terrible
price for greed and desire
(Mme. L’s fatal flaw, her
desire for material things, her
‘fakeness’ just like the
necklace)

16. Flannery O’Connor, in
full Mary Flannery
O’Connor, (born March 25,
1925, Savannah, Georgia,
U.S.—died August 3,
1964, Milledgeville, Georgia),
American novelist and short-
story writer whose works,
usually set in the rural
American South and often
treating of alienation,
concern the relationship
between the individual and
God.

17. O’Connor grew up in a prominent Roman
Catholic family in her native Georgia. She lived
in Savannah until her adolescence, but the worsening
of her father’s lupus erythematosus forced the family to
relocate in 1938 to the home in rural Milledgeville
where her mother had been raised. After graduating
from Georgia State College for Women (now Georgia
College & State University) in 1945, she studied
creative writing at the University of Iowa Writers’
Workshop.

18. Flannery O'Connor best short stories
1. A Good Man is Hard to Find
Perhaps her most well-known out of all her published work, this story focuses on a
family on a road trip to East Tennessee with disastrous consequences. It centers
around varying moral codes, although its ending and the most prominent theme
are controversial amongst critics.
2. Good Country People
features a traveling Bible salesman that is invited for dinner at a farm where the
one-legged woman is an atheist. This transgresses very bizarrely in a way that it
is quite impossible to prepare you for without spoiling it completely.

19. 3. Revelation
Published in O’Connor’s short story collection, Everything That Rises Must
she finished during her final battle with lupus and was published after her
“Revelation” has religious themes, as implied by the title. It is set in a
room and focuses on a very judgemental and racist older woman who
superior to everyone.
4. The Displaced Person
A slightly longer choice than the rest, “The Displaced Person” takes place
on a farm in Georgia just after the Second World War. A Polish refugee
(hence ‘displaced’) comes to work on the farm and turns out to be a very
good worker, much to the dismay of the Shortley’s who already work on
the farm. This ends in typical O’Connor fashion, of course.
5. The Barber
This is lesser known and acknowledged than the rest, being one of her
earlier works. It focuses on a professor explaining his liberal political views
and trying to convince people to vote for a progressive candidate, with very
little success.

20. Summary
Mrs. Turpin and her husband, Claud, enter the waiting room at a doctor's office, where
they have come to treat the ulcer on Claud's leg. There is nowhere for Mrs. Turpin to sit
because a dirty child is taking up too much space on the sofa. Mrs. Turpin immediately
starts a mindless conversation with the only other woman in the room whom she deems
worthy, judging by appearance. This woman, who is dressed stylishly and whom Mrs.
Turpin considers to be pleasant, is the mother of an extremely unattractive, fat, teenage
girl who is reading a book called Human Development and scowling. This girl is Mary
Grace.
Mrs. Turpin sizes up the other occupants of the waiting room, including a white-trash
woman, who is the mother of the dirty boy. Mrs. Turpin thanks Jesus, as she often does
at night before falling asleep, that she is not white-trashy or black. She considers the
classes of people in the world to be distinguished by race and by whether or not they
own a home and land. She begins to feel sorry for Mary Grace because she is so
homely, though Mary Grace has been looking up from her book only to smirk at Mrs.
Turpin. All of a sudden, the girl seems to lose patience and slams her book shut to stare
directly at Mrs. Turpin "as if she had some special reason for disliking her."

21. The conversation between Mrs. Turpin and Mary Grace's mother turns to
farm, and Mrs. Turpin says that she and Claud own a home and land and
have hogs which they keep in a pen so their feet don't get dirty; they
keep them clean by hosing them down. The white-trash woman
expresses her distaste for the idea of owning hogs. A black delivery boy
enters with a delivery for the doctor's office, and Mrs. Turpin deliberately
shows him kindness. Mary Grace continues to show signs of losing
patience with the conversation as her mother, Mrs. Turpin, and the white-
trash woman discuss the possibility of sending all black Americans back
to Africa. Again, Mrs. Turpin feels thankful that Jesus has made her white
and privileged, and all of a sudden Mary Grace's stare becomes more
intense and violent as if she can read Mrs. Turpin's mind.

22. Mrs. Turpin reacts by trying to engage Mary Grace in conversation about
college and the book she is reading, but Mary Grace refuses to
participate. Instead, her mother talks about how ungrateful she is and
what a shame it is that she has such a bad disposition. Mrs. Turpin
responds that she is always grateful for making her life the way it is, and
exclaims aloud, "Thank you, Jesus!" At that point, Mary Grace hurls her
book at Mrs. Turpin's face and physically attacks her, strangling her neck.
Almost immediately, she is pulled off and falls on the floor, where she lies
with her eyes rolling in her head. Mrs. Turpin asks, "What you got to say
to me?" and Mary Grace responds, "Go back to hell where you came
from, you old wart hog." Soon, Mary Grace and her mother leave in an
ambulance and Mrs. Turpin and Claud go home.

23. They spend the afternoon lying in bed resting, and while Claud sleeps, Mrs. Turpin
fixates on what the girl said to her. She cries at first but then gets angry that she should
be the target of this message since there were so many other, lesser people in the
room to whom it could have been directed. Before Claud takes the black farmhands
home in the pick-up truck, Mrs. Turpin brings them ice-cold water to drink. Mrs. Turpin
confides in them about what happened, but when they react with sympathy and
compliments she only becomes annoyed since she knows they are insincere.
Before they have finished drinking, she goes back into the kitchen and decides to go to
the pig parlor. She tries to justify their existence in her mind, thinking about how smart
they are and all that they can do. She sends Claud on his way to take the farm hands
home in the pick-up truck and grabs the hose to spray down the hogs. She asks God
why he sent her such a message and is unable to understand how she can be "saved
and from hell too." She addresses God and Mary Grace at the same time, revealing
her disdain for white trash and black people. Then she challenges God, saying, "Go
on, call me a hog again... Who do you think you are?" Immediately, she has a vision.

24. She sees a streak of light extending upward into the sky, surrounded by
fire, like a bridge. A horde of people advances from the earth toward
Heaven, but in the front are all those whom Mrs. Turpin considers below
herself: white-trash, now clean, black people, and "freaks and lunatics"
like Mary Grace seems to be. At the end of the procession are people like
her and Claud, who have been stripped of their earthly virtues (like
kindness to those they consider to be inferiors). The vision reveals to her
that all people are equal in God's eyes, and she is successfully moved.

25. THEME
Judgment,
Grace
Racism
THEME

26. POINT OF VIEW
The story is narrated in
the third person and
begins with the main
protagonist, Mrs. Turpin
looking for a seat in a
doctor’s waiting room.
Her husband Claud has
what Mrs. Turpin
believes is an ulcer on
his leg and she wants a
doctor to have a look at
it.