The Hundred Dresses - Summary, Title Appropriateness & Lessons learnt from the story

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The Hundred Dresses Summary

·       The story brings to fore how a girl named Wanda Petronski is ridiculed on account of her ethnicity & eccentric name.

·       Wanda Petronski is a Polish immigrant.

·       She is a quiet and shy girl. Her family has settled in America.

·        She attends school with American children who mock her for her strange name. They find her name to be the weirdest in the classroom.

·       She is poor and can always be seen wearing a faded blue dress.

·       Her classmates tease her as she has claimed to have a hundred dresses “all lined up” in her closet; however, she is always seen wearing the same dress.

·       The ones who mainly tease her are - Peggy and Maddie, who are best friends.

·       Peggy is the most famous girl in school.

·       Peggy and Maddie always wait for Wanda before school, so that they could make fun of her.

·        Maddie, who herself is a poor girl, dislikes Peggy’s ruthless fun making of Wanda.

·       Maddie is afraid that she could be next to be made fun of.

·       She wishes Peggy to stop making fun of Wanda, but could not gather courage to face her as she is afraid that she might lose her friendship.

·       Peggy who makes fun of Wanda doesn’t do it intentionally, however she is curious to know about the hundred dresses owned by Wanda.

·       She feels amused to know that she owns 100 dresses however always wear the same dress to school.

·       Peggy feels that Wanda lies to have 100 dresses.

·       However, all their doubts clear on the result day of the drawing competition.

·       The classroom was bedecked with one hundred drawings portraying different hundred dresses and each one extremely beautiful.

·       Peggy and Maddie feel awestruck to know the theory of a hundred dresses and feel guilty to mistreat her.


Title Justification

The title is quite appropriate and the whole story revolves around it. The hundred dresses that Wanda claims to have put her in worst mockery. Peggy along with her friends leaves not even a single chance to ridicule her. However, in the end, when Wanda wins the drawing competition and all her drawings portraying different 100 dresses, each one extremely beautiful; Peggy realizes her mistake and feels guilty to have ridiculed Wanda.

Lesson learnt from the story

·       Don’t judge a book according to its cover.

·       Don’t discriminate on any basis.

·       Consider inner beauty not only the outer appearance, as it is aptly said that a beautiful apple can be rotten from inside.  


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