Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Personal narrative personal identity
Essay on the narrative approach to understanding identity
Personal narrative personal identity
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: Personal narrative personal identity
In “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”, Miss Oates created a cautionary tale that shows the consequences of being selfish and self-absorbed. Although this short story is completely original, the protagonist and antagonist characters seem to resemble a well-known fairy tale. The protagonist of the story, Connie, reminds me of Little Red Riding Hood. Like Little Red Riding Hood, Connie is naive and childish in her ways, unaware of the dangers in the real world. Connie still believed that when she met a boy, they would have a “Cinderella” like kind of romance where a boy rescues her from her family and, like a Disney fairy tale, live happily ever after. This was evident in when she began “wondering about the boy from the night before and how nice he had been...the way it was in movies and promised in songs”. Connie believed that “Eddie” was her “prince charming”, letting her all the easily be fooled by Arnold Friend. …show more content…
When “Eddie” started talking to Connie and her friends, they thought of him as cool. However, after he asked Connie for a bite to eat and she obliged, Connie thought of him as a hero who drove golden jalopy convertible, whisking her off her feet. Like the story Cinderella, Connie told her family nothing of “Eddie”, including her sister, probably because she would get in trouble. When “Eddie” appears in her driveway and introduce himself as Arnold Friend, Connie becomes cautious of him. Then, Connie notices, in like Little Red Riding Hood, Arnold was a wolf in sheep’s clothing. For instance, she began to take note of his unshaven face that made him look older. Then, he pulls his sunglasses back carefully as if he were wearing a wig, which did happen to be a wig. Finally, when Arnold Friend’s fake smile faded, Connie could see he was a lot older than what he told
First of all, Connie was not happy at home. The story says that her father "was away at work most of the time," and "didn't bother talking much to them," so Connie didn't have love from him and had to find male attention somewhere else. Connie found her happiness in escaping with her friend to the drive-in restaurant and daydreaming about boys. But the happiness she found in both of these things had nothing to do with actual events; it is based on a fantasy. When she was out at the drive-in with a boy, her face gleamed "with the joy that had nothing to do with Eddie or even this place; it might have been the music." When she daydreamed about boys, they all "fell back and dissolved into a single face that was not even a face, but an idea, a feeling mixed up with the urgent pounding of the music..."
Arnold Friend takes advantage of Connie’s teenage innocence for something of a much more sinister purpose. Connie thought she had it all figured out until Arnold Friend came into her life and up her driveway on one summer, Sunday afternoon and made her realize how big and scary the world can be. Arnold embodies everything that Connie has dreamed about in a boy, but is in the most malevolent form of Connie’s dream boy. She always wanted to get away from her family because she has always felt as if she didn’t belong and Arnold can make this possible just in the most predatory way. She always thought sex would be sweet (and consensual) and that she would be in charge of how it progressed, Arnold strips her of the authority she’s held in any other encounter with a boy. The moral of the story is always be careful what you wish
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 “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?”, Oates wants to show a more intellectual and symbolic meaning in this short story. Oates has many symbolic archetypes throughout the short story along with an allegory. Oates uses these elements in her story by the selection of detail and word choice used. Oates does this because she wants to teach her audience a moral lesson.
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”
An unstable home filled with broken relationships is like a shattered glass it can never be the same again because the damage is already done. Author Joyce Carol Oates portrays this in her short story “Where are you going. Where have you been?” The main character of the short story feeds off her broken home. Her family household situation motivates her to be a rebel. She ends up making so decisions that will change her life in a negative way.
Joyce Carol Oates' short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" written in the late sixties, reveals several explanations of its plot. The story revolves around a young girl being seduced, kidnapped, raped and then killed. The story is purposely vague and that may lead to different interpretations. Teenage sex is one way to look at it while drug use or the eerie thought that something supernatural may be happening may be another. The story combines elements of what everyone may have experienced as an adolescent mixed with the unexpected dangers of vanity, drugs, music and trust at an early age. Ultimately, it is up to the reader to choose what the real meaning of this story is. At one point or another one has encountered, either through personal experience or through observation, a teenager who believes that the world is plotting against them. The angst of older siblings, peer pressure set upon them by their friends, the need for individualism, and the false pretense that at fifteen years of age, they are grown are all factors which affect the main character in this story.
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...
Oates, Joyce Carol. “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”. Backpack Literature. An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. Ed. X.J. Kennedy & Dana Gioia. 4th ed. New Jersey: Pearson, 2006. (323-336). Print.
When approached by Arnold Friend at first, she was skeptical but was still charmed by him. As she began to feel uneasy, Connie could have used her intuition to realize that he was trouble. Once she had been engaged by Arnold, her life was over. The influences on Connie and her lack of instilled reasoning led to her down fall. Her family’s fragmented nature was echoed in her actions; consequently, she was unable to communicate with her parents, and she was never was able to learn anything of significance. She felt abandoned and rejected, because no one took the initiative to teach her how to make good decisions. Connie was unable to mature until she was faced with death and self sacrifice. In the end, her situation made it difficult for her to think and reason beyond the position she was in. By not being able apply insight, she fell into Arnold Friends lure. Misguidance by the parents strongly contributed to Connie’s
Joyce Carol Oates’s “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” tells the tale of a fifteen year old girl named Connie living in the early 1960’s who is stalked and ultimately abducted by a man who calls himself Arnold Friend. The short story is based on a true event, but has been analyzed by many literary scholars and allegedly possesses numerous underlying themes. Two of the most popular interpretations of the story are that the entire scenario is only dreamt by Connie (Rubin, 58) and that the abductor is really the devil in disguise (Easterly, 537). But the truth is that sometimes people really can just be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Connie, a victim of terrifying circumstance will be forever changed by her interactions with Friend.
Arnold Friend imposes a devilish and menacing pressure upon Connie, who ultimate gives in, like a maiden entranced by a vampire's gaze. His appearance, sayings, and doing all combine to form a terrifying character that seems both reasonable and unlikely at the same time. There are people like Arnold Friend out there, not as incoherently assembled, and still he seems an extraordinary case of stalker. A small and even insignificant aside about his name, Arnold Friend, is that with the R's his name would read A'nold F'iend, or "An Old Fiend" i.e. the devil. But, regardless, Arnold Friend is very precisely portrayed as a corrupter of youths and a deflowerer of virgins. Without his useless sweet-nothings or his strange balance problem, he would come across less dangerous and alluring.
Oates, Joyce C. "Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?" Compact Literature. By Laurie G. Kirszner and Stephen R. Mandell. 8th ed. Boston: Wadsworth, 2013. 505-16. Print.
Gale Kozikowski, Stan. " The Wishes and Dreams Our Hearts Make in Oates's 'Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?'. " Journal of the Short Story in English. 33 (Autumn 1999): 89-103.
Oates, Carol Joyce. “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?." Kirszner and Mandell. 505-516. Compact Literature. Boston: Wadsworth,2013,2012,2007. Print.