Stories involving a predator and prey have been prevalent throughout time, and those stories usually involve attractive young girls. Attractive unassuming girls are stalked by older men that pretend to be someone that they are not. One prominent example of a predator and prey story occurs in Joyce Carol Oates story, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” was based off an article that Oates had read, about a twenty-three-year-old man who would hangout around young girls, pick them up, and take them for rides in his gold convertible, and he was convicted of murdering three of them (Hirschberg 773). In her story, Oates uses a suspenseful plot line, characters Connie and Arnold Friend, and imagery …show more content…
to describe a typical predator and prey story. The first aspect of this essay that should be mentioned is the plot line, which kept the reader in suspense throughout the story.
The story began with a pretty girl that was a little rebellious and quickly turned into a nightmare for an unassuming young girl. One Sunday, Connie’s family went to a barbecue without her. Then Arnold Friend, basically a stranger appeared at her home when no one was home. Oates’s character Arnold then prompted Connie to go for a ride with him and his friend. Oates started her essay out with smiles and laughter, and continued that for a short period, but then it became much less auspicious for Connie. At first it seemed a little strange, but then Oates’s plot line progressed into something different. It was a simple plot line, but then it became Connie’s worst nightmare. Arnold Friend would not leave and Connie asked him what he was going to do. Arnold then said ‘“Just two things, or maybe there. But I promise it won’t last long and you’ll like me the way you get to like people you’re close to’” (Oates 784). Oates’s plot line progressively became more and more about the predator getting his prey. Connie was now Arnold’s and she gave in once she knew she was …show more content…
caught. The second aspect of Oates’s essay that really drove her theme home is her characters.
Oates begins by depicting a typical insurrections teenage girl. Connie is that young rebellious girl that Oates implies is beautiful, envied, and popular. Connie defies her parents wishes by hanging out where the older kids hang out, which is typically what the prey does in a story. Oates stated that Connie would lie to her parents and pretend to go shopping and “Sometimes they did go shopping or to a movie, but sometimes they went across the highway, ducking fast across the busy road, to a drive-in restaurant where older kids hung out” (774). Connie would and her friends would go to a place where they felt wanted. Many of the boys would call her and her friends over, like Eddie, a boy she met at the drive-in (Oates 774). Connie displays the typical character traits of prey, and Arnold Friend stalks his prey like the typical
predator. The second character and the most prominent character that Oates presents is Arnold Friend. Arnold is what the reader assumes is a confident young teenager that wishes to take advantage of any young girl that will let him. Arnold is possibly the most important character in this essay. Oates really drives home the theme of predator and prey in this essay. Right when Connie meets Arnold for the first time Arnold says, ‘“Gonne get you, baby”’ (Oates 775). This is where the reader first meets Arnold and it is so brief that the reader could almost ignore this character, but Oates does not let that happen. As the story progresses, so does Arnold’s involvement. Arnold shows up to Connie’s house when no one is home and proceeds to know everything about her. Connie asks Arnold how she knew her name and he says, ‘“I took a special interest in you, such a pretty girl, and found out all about you”’ (779). Arnold wants Connie, and Oates makes that completely obvious. Oates made Arnold obsess over his prey and Arnold was willing to do anything to obtain his prey. Arnold told Connie, ‘“Honey, I’m not coming in there but you are coming out here”’ (Oates 782). By explaining what Arnold wanted to do and what he planned to do, Oates made Arnold the quintessential predator that stalked his prey, terrorized his prey, and took his prey. The final aspect of Oates’s story that depicts her theme of predator and prey is her imagery. It is almost hard to forget the images that she brands into the reader’s mind. Oates’s imagery first occurs when she introduces Connie. Connie seems like the All-American popular girl that everyone loves to hate: “Connie had long dark blond hair that drew anyone’s eye to it, and she wore part of it pulled up on her head and puffed out and the rest of it she let fall down her back” (Oates 774). Then when Oates introduced Arnold for the first time the reader was able to imagine a modern day predator: “It was a boy with shaggy black hair, in a convertible jalopy painted gold. He stared at her and then his lips widened into a grin” (Oates 775). Oates really burns that image into the reader’s head of a creepy smile of a predator. Each time Oats mentioned an aspect of her essay, she used vivid imagery to really personify her stories theme. Connie, the sweet innocent teenager, and Arnold the ferocious predator that was willing to do anything to bring home his prey. In her essay, Oates depicted one young girl, and a nefarious man that presented himself as a teenager. It was the typical predator prey story and Oates really drove that theme home with her plot line. Each time, Connie became weaker and more like a wild animal that had given up during the chase and just let the predator consume her, and Arnold became more aggressive and angry like a predator would if his prey was trying to escape. Her characters also fell into their roles rather well. Connie assumed her position as the prey at the end and just got in the car with Arnold, and Arnold won. Arnold got what he came for, just like a predator would. Oates then really instills her theme to the reader through her phenomenal imagery. Arnold the predator that camouflaged himself as a teenager stalked his prey, and Connie the beautiful girl that many seem to be envious of. Oates really present her theme throughout her entire story by using her plot line, characters, and imagery. Oates lets the reader imagine what it would be like in Connie’s shoes. The fear, anxiety, and trepidation. The reader can feel it though out the essay, and Oates did a fantastic job at depicting her theme of predator and prey.
Connie, from “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”, wants to rebel against her family. She uses her attractiveness to flirt with boys at the local restaurant behind their backs as a form of rebellion. She feels as though her family does not appreciate her; her father does not pay any attention to her and her mother constantly compares her to her sister, criticizing her every move and asking why she cares so much about her appearance. On one of her outings she sees a boy who she vainly chooses to ignore. Later he shows up at her house posing as her friend, calling himself Arnold Friend, and talking to her as though he is another boy she flirts with down at the diner and pretending to be her age. She subtly flirts with him at first, only realizing the danger when it is too late.
Come over here to me. Now come out through the kitchen to me, honey, and let’s see a smile, try it, you’re a brave, sweet little girl’”(Oates 7). “She put her hand against the screen. She watched herself push the door slowly open as if she were back safe somewhere in the other doorway, watching this body and this head of long hair moving out into the sunlight where Arnold Friend waited”(7). What had gotten into Connie, why would she go out with Arnold knowing that all he is going to do is hurt her?
"Connie, don't fool around with me. I mean—I mean, don't fool around," he said, shaking his head. He laughed incredulously. He placed his sunglasses on top of his head, carefully, as if he were indeed wearing a wig…” (Oates 6). Joyce Carol Oates’ short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” highlights an altercation, meeting, conflict and dispute between a teenage girl, named Connie, and a psychotic rapist named Arnold Friend. Throughout their altercation, Arnold Friend tempts and encourages Connie to get in the car with him and lead her to a variety of possible dangerous situations, one of which includes her getting raped . There is no doubt that Joyce Carol Oates’ uses Arnold Friend in her short story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” to symbolize the Devil and embody all of the evil and sinister forces that are present in our world. This becomes apparent when the reader focuses on how deranged Arnold Friend is and begins to
Joyce Carol Oates’s “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” focuses on two main characters, Connie and Arnold Friend. The two characters have extreme conflict throughout the short story and in the end only one wins. The literary device of characterization in the story helps to clarify the Greek and Biblical reasons for one character’s win and the other’s lose.
By doing that, it also gave Arnold Friend a hint that she was easy to manipulate. Then, concerning the dialogue element, the explanation for both the movie and the short-story will be the same since I use the passage between Arnold Friend and Connie at her house. Since Connie is responding so naively at the very beginning of their conversation, it is almost certain that Arnold would succeed to manipulate her. In fact, the biggest mistake she made was to actually get out of the house and start the conversation with him: "She went into the kitchen and approached the door slowly, then hung out the screen door, her bare toes curling down off the step" (314). Through this action, it already gave Arnold Friend the idea that she is innocent and vulnerable; the only thing left was to seduce her with his words. Finally, I believe the movie would better suits the theme because we can visually observe how innocent she is with her mimics, her behaviour, her clothing. Although Oates’ short-story is very descriptive, the message behind this story doesn’t have the same effect on us than the
stuffed boots; these features led her to believe he was not a teenager, but in
The overuse of biblical allusions throughout the story helps to expose the naive nature of Connie that reveals her as a victim of evil which shows that lust often transgresses on an individual’s identity. In “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been,” Joyce Carol Oates expressed the subjective ideas by symbolizing Arnold Friend as a devil that tempts a clueless teenage girl Connie, who wanted to experience love.
In “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” by Joyce Carol Oates, Connie is a normal teenage girl who is approached outside her home by a guy named Arnold Friend who threatens to harm her, and she obeys, if she does not get in the car with him. Connie is the main character in this story who teaches us that sometimes we might search for adult independence too early before we are actually ready to be independent and on our own. Connie is so focused on her appearance that she works hard to create a mature and attractive adult persona that will get her attention from guys. This search for independence conflicts with Connie’s relationship with her family and their protection of her. Connie’s insecurity and low self-esteem is triggered by her fear of intimacy. Connie confuses having the attention of men with actually having them pursue her in a sexual way.
“He wagged a finger and laughed and said, “Gonna get you, baby.” The quote foreshadows future events in the story because of the fact that Arnold says, “Gonna get you, baby.” There’s no actual reasoning behind why he chooses her, but it states he might try something later on. Oates also uses small wording to kind of hint at the readers. “Her mind was filled was all filled with trash daydreams.” (Oates 1). This quote tends to shape the short story. This quote leads readers to the possibility that Connie’s experience with Arnold could have all been a foreshadowing to a trashy daydream. In the article “Oates’s Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” by David K. Gratz, he also points out the quote. “Both Rubin and Winslow note that seems to be falling asleep just before he arrives, and Rubin points out the nightmare quality of her being unable to act in the end.” (Gratz). This article more or less solidifies the fact that Connie might of fell asleep and dreamed up the whole encounter. In all, Oates uses multiple accounts of foreshadowing to further the possibility of the encounter being all just a bad dream of
...tomy between reality and dreams quite well throughout her piece. She provides the reader with two ways to experience the story: either as reality or as reality that turns into a nightmare. This dichotomy that Oates creates “allows the reader to escape this story, and allows this story to end” (Hurley 374). The end of the story shows Connie entering the new world of experience, and Oates wants the reader to sense her fear. Oates intricately provides the reader with clues that help see why Connie’s experience with Arnold is just a nightmare. She also allows the reader to see how this nightmare is meant to scare Connie into making the realization that her decisions have consequences. I hope that anyone reading this learns from Connie that not everything we do is good for us, and we have to think about the consequences of our actions, whether good or bad, before we act.
The short story, “ Where are you going, Where have you been?” by Joyce Carol Oates, an award-winning author, is known for unmasking the evil within everything and presenting it to the world through a fictional story. In what is thought to be her most terrifying yet highly acclaimed short story, Oates references many fairy tales that help carve the short story into a realistic allegory. She models the short story after the real-life murder of a teenage girl by the American serial killer Charles Schmid also known as the “Pied Piper of Tuscon .” Knowing this information allows a greater sense of reality opposed to fiction because the events throughout the story are fairly similar to the tragic horror that took place on May 31, 1964. The story deals with the temptations and the coming of age of a teenage girl while challenging the perception of America during the 60’s. Oates references several fairy tales throughout the story to help guide the reader and give a sense of an allusion. There were three fairy tales that stood out the most in the story: Cinderella, the Beauty and the Beast, and Little Red Riding Hood.
In the short story, Connie is a young, naïve, sassy, little girl who hates her mom and sister. According to Oates, “Connie wished her mother was dead” (324). Connie enjoys going out with her friends and going to a drive-in restaurant where the older kids hang out. Connie is innocent, but thinks about love and sex. She is desperate to appeal to boys and succeeds at it when a boy with shaggy black hair says to her, “Gonna get you, baby” (325). Her encounter with this boy will change her life forever, because he is the antagonist that influences Connie’s loss of innocence. On a Sunday afternoon, the boy, Arnold Friend, visits Connie and asks her to come for a ride, which she declines. But, Arnold Friend won’t take “no” for an answer and threatens to go in the house. For example when Connie says she will call the cops, Arnold says “Soon as you touch the phone I don’t need to keep my promise and come inside”
Connie was tired of the life she was living and, she was ready to make decisions for herself and to deal with the consequences for them. She knew that if her parents found out about her going to the diner that she would be in trouble. Connie did not care about the consequences for her actions. She felt like it was time to grow up and be a woman. She wanted to start to experiment with her sexuality. Connie wanted boys to start to notice her and talk to her. Connie thinks that guys could be her savior by helping deliver her from the pressure and anxieties from her sister and mother. Her going out on her own makes her realize that she does not have to please anyone, only herself. When Connie and her friend went to the diner she met this guy Arnold. Obviously being with Eddie for three hours in a dark alley and diner was not the best first move for her. This is the one decision that will change her life forever. This was probably the first guy that gave Connie some attention. So obviously she is going to soak him up and just...
In the short story “Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?”, by Joyce Carol Oates, the use of the symbolism of Connie’s clothes, her fascination with her beauty, Arnold Friend’s car and Arnold Friend himself help to understand the story’s theme of evil and manipulation. The story, peppered with underlying tones of evil, finds Oates writing about 15-year-old Connie, the protagonist of the story, a pretty girl who is a little too into her own attractiveness, which eventually gets her into trouble with a man named Arnold Friend. The story is liberally doused with symbolism, from the way Connie dresses to the shoes on Arnold Friend’s feet. In “Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?” the reader can pick up on some of the symbols very easily, while others need deeper thought. The subtle hints of symbolism throughout the story create a riveting tale that draws the reader in. Connie finally succumbs to Arnold Friend at the end of the story, it then becomes obvious that he represents the devil and the symbolism of her clothing and Arnold’s car all tie together to create a better understanding of the story.
Rubin attempts to convey the idea that Connie falls asleep in the sun and has a daydream in which her “…intense desire for total sexual experience runs headlong into her innate fear…” (58); and aspects of the story do seem dream like - for instance the way in which the boys in Connie’s daydreams “…dissolved into a single face…” (210), but the supposition that the entire episode is a dream does not ring true. There are many instances in which Connie perceives the frightening truth quite clearly; she is able to identify the many separate elements of Friend’s persona - “… that slippery friendly smile of his… [and] the singsong way he talked…” (214). But because of the lack of attachment with her own family, and her limited experience in relating deeply to others, “…all of these things did not come together” (214) and Connie is unable to recognize the real danger that Arnold Friend poses until it is too late.