Narrative analysis of ‘The Piece of String’ by Guy De Maupassant

 

        INTRODUCTION

Henri René Albert Guy de Maupassant (5 August 1850 – 6 July 1893) was a French literary writer and as a representative of the naturalist school of writers. Guy De Maupassant generates the aesthetic appeal through showing the everyday chores’ vicious desires.   Many of his work is set in Normandy or Paris. Which criticizes the hypocritical and seductive situations of the society, and supports the middle class of the society.

The Piece of String is his famous short story that portrays the gloomy issues of the society, pertaining to the labor class of the society. Maupassant has drawn the reader’s attention towards the main character of his story, who are suffering from the mental disruption caused by his faulty action of picking a piece of string from the land, road to the village and is mistaken by his rivalry as a thief. 

        Textual medium:

The narrative of “The Piece of String” consists of 2530 words and the estimated word length of a short story is about 1000-20,000 words. It is clear from the word limit of the narrative that it is the short story. Further the narrative of “The Piece of String” revolves around one character’s life, who is the protagonist, named Maitre Hauchecorne, and there we have another main character identified as the antagonist named Maitre Malandain who becomes the cause of the conflict in the story, the accusation of theft by Hauchecorne’s rival is only event that leads his tragic downfall, leaving behind the suspense for the reader. All the events excite its reader and create the uncertain cognitive state that develops the atmosphere of depression and dejection. Maupassant has used the short story as a textual medium to describe the significant but neglected issue of the modern civilization that is the disrespect of socially low people and working class. He has masterly depicted the gloomy side of the society in a very brief way but through an immediate, but a single focused action taken place in the story. The characters he has used in the story are of minor importance except the two, one is protagonist and the other one is antagonist.

        Sociolinguistic code

Sociolinguistic is the study of the relationship between the language and the context in which it is used further it is the study of the relationship between language and society. Maupassant uses the language that shows the cultural context of the narrative through which the reader finds easily the historical background.

·         Context and Dialects of the story

The story is written in 1883, showing the setting of 1880 in the village of Goderville located in the Normandy, France. The events take place in the village on different places. Goderville is an ancient village that was established in 9^th century. In The Main Square of the village there is the Town Market, Jourdain’s Office and Mayor’s Office are also located in that village and the other actions take place in the tavern. The description of the men clearly shows their status and tasks of the daily routine life. The words like “their long legs twisted and deformed” show the pathetic condition of the peasants in consequence of their “slow and painful labors of the country”, they “dragged a cow or a calf at the end of a rope” is the depiction of the rural site. Maupassant through the use of language has drawn the picture of historical, cultural and linguistic setting of the narrative, smell “of the stable, of milk, of hay and of perspiration, giving off that half-human and half-animal odor”. The words like “cognac”, “va”, “char-a-bancs” and “gendarmes” and “accost” show the cultural setting of the story.

        Characterization:

As this is the short story, the characters here described are a few one, who takes some action other than the protagonist but their actions are of minor importance. Maitre Hauchecorne is the protagonist, who picks up a piece of string because of his economical nature about everything and later he suffers a lot from this piece and in struggle of proving his innocence dies and the last words of his innocence haunt him till upon his deathbed, “A piece of string, a piece of string. Look, here it is, ‘M’sieu the Mayor. A piece of string.” The other main character is the antagonist, whose name Maitre Malandain, the harness man once quarreled with the protagonist, sees Houchcorne picking up the piece of string and conceives him as picking the pocketbook and accuses him. Because Hauchecorne, while picking the piece of string notices that his enemy has watched him picking worthless string, feels embarrassed and pretends he is looking for something else on the ground. There are several other unnamed peasants, a woman, a town crier, Maitre Houcucrene who lost his pocket book containing five hundred francs.

            Actions and Events

Though the writer has not depicted any extraordinary action done by any character and events are also simple related to rural life and their daily routine works for earning. He begins his story with description of peasants and their wives, how they are moving towards Goderville for doing their business. Later they are shown in a big hall for dinner. They also discuss their “sales and purchases” and they also talk about weather “good for green stuffs, but a little wet for wheat”.

Later on main character, protagonist, Maitre Hauchecorne is shown, picking up a piece of string from garbage because of his social condition, he thinks “everything was worth picking up”. This action, taken by protagonist takes him to downfall in a sense like an another character perceives him as picking up a leather “pocket-book” that was lost by someone in Goderville, during nine and ten in the morning. Maitre Hauchecorne is later called by mayor, where he tries to prove himself as innocent but he “was searched. Nothing was found upon him”.

Everyone who sees him after coming from Mayer’s office calls him liar and he tries his best to convince them with his story or by showing them their pocket “turning it outside”, at last pocket-book was returned to mayor by Marius Paumelle to Maitre Holbreque.

            Point of View

This short story is described in third person narration. The writer here with the help of unknown narrator sees or observers the condition and narrates it. The narrator first describes the condition of Goderville, social life of peasants, their coming and doing their job, how they physically look. Later he describes how the main character Maitre Hauchecorne comes and picks up the piece of string and how his action becomes the cause of his downfall.

At some extent, he gives narrations to characters. The characters by themselves narrate their point of view, as in the case of protagonist, when he is called by mayor, he describes his feelings in his own words before mayor and the mayor also gives his remarks about the protagonists.

          Textual Structure

Textual structure accounts for the way individual narrative units are arranged and organized in a story. This strategy explains the text’s main idea created in the specific style to deliver the details. There are following common structures:

·         Description

·         Sequence

·         Problem and solution

·         Cause and Effect

·         Compare and Contrast

In the short story The Piece of String Guy de Maupassant has used the structure of Cause and Effect because the plot of the story clearly shows the causal relationship between the specific events taken places in the story that go on to deliver the effects of the causative actions of the text. The story’s conflict is caused by the faulty action of protagonist, Maitre Houchecorne, leading his tragic downfall as a result of picking trivial piece of string from the ground affecting the rest of Hauchecorne’s life.

               Intertextuality

The term intertextuality is reserved for the technique of “allusion”. This story does not exist in a social and historical vacuum; here we find the intertextual reference related to the myth of Sisyphus. Guy de Maupassant has depicted his idea through intertextuality. Here in the story we find the conflict of the worldly reality that what we think to have to be done but what we get in result of our efforts and thinking, as Houchecorne’s economical nature brings for him the punishment of guilt till his death, representing the human condition of perpetual suffering without hope of success. Sisyphus like Houchecorne never finds in life the meaning that he wants to find. Houchecorne tries to find the value of truth by claiming his innocence continuously but he suffers a catastrophic end in his struggle of proving himself innocence.

           Plot

This short story’s plot revolves around the main character, Maître Hauchecorne, though there is also description of market, where the main event takes place and the big hall, where all peasants are gathered for dinner. The story depicts the daily routine life of peasant at Goreville, their business status, sales and purchases and female peasants are also described to some extent.

The whole story the Piece of String is based on a complete plot structure as all the events are arranged categorically:

·         Exposition

·         Rising Action

·         Climax

·         Falling Action

·         Resolution

The main character is exposed by his financial and physical condition. He is a peasant and financially weak and thinks that everything should be picked up from earth due to his economical nature. The rising action of story is picking up of a piece of string from earth by Maître Hauchecorne, while harness man sees him. Then there comes the climax of the story that makes the plot more complex and protagonist is accused of picking up a pocket book from earth that contains some shillings and documents. Maitre Hauchcorne tries to prove him innocent but nobody believes his story of string and starts saying him liar and thief. After climax there is falling action taken place in the story by the writer, falling action is, when pocket book is found and is returned by Marius Paumelle to the owner. This all results in death of protagonist because he was accused of lying and he took this statement to his heart. After protagonist’s death the story of string is revealed but for those who are not cruel, unjust and mean and here the story resolves the very issue of society that is the lying and accusing lower class of the society who is innocent and dies for character’s dignity and honesty. As Hauchecorne dies in consequence of the wrongful accusations of the people uttering the words, “it was only a piece of string”.

        Themes

The story begins with the busy life of people at market depicting how they have brought their goods to market? How they arrange them for sale? The narrator also describes the physical condition of peasants “Their long legs were twisted and deformed by the slow, painful labors of the country, by bending over to plough, which is what also makes their left shoulders too high”. He depicts how hardly they are working to earn money for good meal for them. This all, described above, shows the economic condition of society.

Later on, an action done by protagonist that is mistaken by another character is described. The protagonist is considered as the one who has been found guilty on picking up the lost pocket book from market. No one believes his oaths rather the rude behavior of society towards protagonist shows the cruelty and hypocrisy of the rich people, in result he suffers because of people behavior. This story explores that a single person fails to defend himself before a group of thousand liars. The rich are in power and do what they think is good without knowing the truths about the actual situations and circumstances.

         Setting

This short story’s setting is a village, named Goreville in France. The story, The Piece of String is depicted in the main market, in big dinner hall, in the city mayor’s office and at the house of the protagonist. At first, writer explains the hustle and bustle of busy market and the Maître Hauchecorne picking of string from bazar, then peasants are shown in big dining hall. Later on protagonist is shown in mayor’s office at mayor’s call. At the end the protagonist is found at his own home, ill, on his death bed uttering his innocence but dies.  

        Conclusion

          It is clear from above discussed points that Guy De Maupassant has an excellent ability to convey a universal message through ordinary characters and minor incidents. As different parts of story The Piece of String are being focused through narrative stylistic analysis, narration style, point of view, characters of story, actions and eventsby the writer. It is clear through this analysis that there is merely a single incident which could be assumed as the reason of protagonist downfall, though there is a minor act of picking up a piece of string done by protagonist, but this act leads him towards his tragic downfall.

          Further the description of market and people gathered at a big hall for dinner, makes it clear that Guy De Maupassant is also a keen observer of society. He explains very minor things, like things present in market, women’s dealing with their things, feelings of tiredness on peasants faces and many more. He thus revolves his story around a very minor character and through these minor characters depicts a universal dilemma.