Connie's World

Joyce Carol Oates began her short story, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?,” with a 15 year old girl named Connie whose mother that had always compared her to her sister June. This gave the reader a chance to establish a connection with Connie. Since almost every teenager has felt a comparison to another sibling at least once in their life, unless they were an only child, but then they were probably compared to family friend’s child. Her mother would say things like “Why don’t you keep your room clean like your sister?” or “How’ve you got your hair fixed – what the hell stinks? Hair spray? You don’t see your sister using that junk” (Oates, 1). Perhaps this is the reason that Connie has created a fantasy against the reality of the life she lives where “everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one for anywhere that was not home” (Oates, 1). However, this is challenged when Connie meets the strange figure of Arnold Friend, who ultimately ends up changing Connie.

It is stated within this short story that her father “was away at work most of the time and when he came home we wanted supper and he read the newspaper at supper and after supper he went to bed” (Oates, 1). This has only contributed to Connie’s unhappiness at home and has most likely impacted her need to find attention from men. For Connie, the escape from home would be going to a shopping plaza with her best girl friend to watch a movie or wander through stores. Some instances, they would cross the highway to a diner and during one particular visit, it is when she met Eddie and the “boy with shaggy black hair, in a convertible jalopy painted gold” (Oates, 2). However, the happiness Connie felt had nothing to do with Eddie or with the diner, bu...

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...efore and after encountering Arnold. This conclusion may lead to several different ideas. Perhaps Connie awakes and becomes aware of her actions and begins to change as a person. Perhaps Connie awakes and is traumatized by the realistic experience that her subconscious dream has created. The exact ending is unknown, leaving the reader to come to their own conclusions.

Works Cited

Gillis, Christina Marsden. "'WHERE ARE YOU GOING, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?': SEDUCTION, SPACE, AND A FITIONAL MODE." Studies In Short Fiction 18.1 (1981): 65. Academic Search Complete. Web. 19 Mar. 2012.

Oates, Joyce Carol. “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” brainstorm-services.com. Stacy Tartar Esch, 2005. Web. 30 May 2011. 1-6. PDF file.

Rubin, Larry. "Oates's WHERE ARE YOU GOING, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?." Explicator 42.4 (1984): 57. Academic Search Complete. Web. 18 Mar. 2012.