At the end of "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” I believe that Connie is a normal girl. Although Connie is illustrated as a self-indulgent and vein teenager I did see anything that stood out in the text with lead me to believe that she was particularly evil. The same goes for her being a good girl she didn’t do anything that I found profoundly good. The fact the Arnold Friend scares Connie into coming with him is a cause for concluding that he is evil. The metaphor that marks the transitions in the lives of the young girls as they reach for their independence is that of retribution they must face from their
Finally, Oates uses irony when Connie tells Arnold that he is "crazy"(72) and he responds by saying that she is the one who is "crazy"(72). This is ironic because it is clear to the reader that Arnold is the one who is truly unstable. Overall, "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" is a work of fiction that employs several different rhetorical devices to create a haunting
She does not get affection from her family, and feels isolated from them. Connie first receives affection from Arnold when he asks her “You wanta come for a ride” (Oates 8). No one has ever offered Connie any affection. Her family looks down on her as the disappointing child and she is just a young girl trying to be loved. Arnold asking her to come for a ride and seeking to spend time with her is the attention she is missing in her daily life.
Both Judy and Connie are described as beautiful, sweet and charming. In both the stories they are drooled upon by many men. In the beginning of “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” Connie is approached by a boy that goes to her high school and being the rude person that she is, she ignores him. She even states that she feels good about ignoring him.
“And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spoke as a dragon” (Revelations:13:11). Revelations depicts a creature, one of which is the Devil. The same Bible verse can represent Arnold Friend (AF), the antagonist, and how he could represent the Devil. In Joyce Carol Oates “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” a fifteen-year-old girl is living life on the edge.
In “Where Are You Going, Where Have you Been?”, Connie, is fifteen years old and is just like any other teenage girl. She daydreams, loves music, and likes to flirt. She is one of the main characters and has a personality that sets her apart from others in the story. In her mind she is the center of everything and she the only one that understands anything going on, “Connie would raise her eyebrows at these familiar complaints and look right through her mother, into a shadowy vision of herself as she was right at that moment: she knew she was pretty and that was everything. ”(Oates 233)
Life is always moving forward, “like a river, the way it [flows] and [twists] about but [is] always rushing,” constantly changing (Villaneuva 139). Both girls started out naive but over time had to accept the world for all its
The short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” was written by the author Joyce Carol Oates in 1966. Oates describes her idea for the story after briefly reading an article about the real-life murderer, Charles Schmid, who lured and murdered three teenage girls (Kirszner & Mandell 523). She uses this idea to create the character, Arnold Friend, and his victim, Connie. Connie is a typical teenage girl portrayed as naïve and self-centered. The short story appears realistic, given that the conflict in the story is based off of real events.
A little over a month ago I was watching television with a friend. We were watching the very first episode of Mr. Robot episode one, season one, I guess it 'd technically be episode 0. I had already seen it, while my friend had not. But at some point in the episode my friend said something to me that immediately bothered me and maybe I 'm bothered too easily but we 're not here to talk about that. If you 've never seen Mr. Robot the main character Elliot Alderson has these running internal monologues where he wonders if he 's going crazy, wonders about the messed up society that we live in, what is real what isn 't, and if it even matters or not.
He tries to seduce and persuade her to go with him for a ride similar to how the Devil lured Eve with a shiny and mysterious apple. Oates displays evidence of biblical allusions regarding Arnold Friend’s appearance and persona in the story by depicting his physical characteristics, his supernatural knowledge, and his demeanor as an image of evil. Connie wants to be desired for her sexuality and Arnold possesses this by his tone throughout the story. His appearance comes
In Joyce Carol Oates fictional short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” the majority of the story lies beneath the surface. More specifically than just the story, you realize that there is more to the character Arnold Friend than what may appear. The author has always remained silent and ambiguous about the real meaning of Arnold Friend’s true nature and she leaves room for the readers to make their own interpretation of him. Readers can analyze Arnold Friend and see him as the devil, he could just be the personification of popular music imagined by Connie in a dream, but Arnold Friend could also be the result of drug use.
Many critics have focused on the familiar element in here are going, where have you been for example, the main character, Connie, is a typical American teen in her psychotically make up and appearance. Even the villain of the story, Arnold friend, is as familiar as the big bad wolf that shows in many masks in literature films. Yet in this paper I want to focus on the strange element in the story mainly about Arnold knew everything about cones family. In Where Are You Going Where Have You Been “Connie realizes that there 's something off about Arnold Friend.
This shows the narrator's desire to be independent and powerful, but also realizing how difficult it can be to do so in a society that doesn't often respect such traits in women. This metaphor highlights the struggle between the narrator's desire to establish her identity and strength and the obligations put on her by her parents and
This interpretation of the story explains how Connie simply fell prey to the common theme of men acting as predators in society. Therefore, Connie had no say in her fate, so she just decided to go quietly with him. However, this theory completely disregards the psychological disorders that Connie has. Connie did not go quietly with Arnold because he was a dominating male. Instead, Connie left due to her numerous unconscious mental problems.
Instead of realizing the danger that she was in, Connie was focused on what Arnold Friend was wearing and how attractive he was. Connie’s obsession with finding her own sexuality overpowered her gut feeling of danger. In an analysis of “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”, Barbara Wiedemann discusses how the antagonist Arnold Friend is based upon serial killer Charles Schmid, who murdered several young girls during the 1960s. In the analysis, Wiedemann
“At its most basic, every story is an attempt to answer the question What happened?” (Norton 85) One of the most significant elements in a short story is plot. Plot is construct by authors and they rearrange the character’s action in a consequential way to shape our response and interpretation (Norton 85). In "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Carol Oates and "Sonny's Blues" by James Baldwin, they use similar plot styles that contributes to the process of maturation for characters in the stories.