- Where has Connie come from? What is the home meant to represent/symbolize?
- Where did she want to go? What details, imagery, figurative language conveys this?
- Why or how has it been cancelled out?
2. How do the descriptions of Connie, June, and Arnold Friend develop characterization and theme?
1. Connie is from a typical small-town home in that era. She is from a typical family. She has a sister who is typical and plain, a father who is so unremarkable that he is largely glossed over, and has a typical teenage relationship with her mother. Her home is supposed to represent her unremarkable roots. However, the home being on a long gravel road implies that it is not a part of a densely populated area. This could represent that her home is removed from society. Her home is in its own separate reality from the rest of the world. Where Connie wanted to go is more of an idea than a tangible place. Connie desired independence. As a teenage girl she began to have more conflicts wither her mother, and as a teenager she began to become obsessed with the idea of living how she wanted to rather than the way her mother wanted her to live. This was shown in how she always went somewhere else than what she told her mother, and in how she hung out at the restaurant mostly filled with older kids. She thought her rebellion would help her branch out and gain independence. All of this was cancelled by Arnold Friend. He gained control of her, and she put her fate into his hands. There can be no independence in a situation like this. Her fate is entirely in a stranger's control, which even worse than the control she was trying to prematurely escape from in the first place.
ReplyDeleteThe development of the characters of Connie, June, and Arnold Friend are symbols within themselves which directly pertain to the theme of seductive to evil. Connie, the main character, is vain and very concerned with the impressions of others. “She was fifteen and she had a quick nervous giggling habit of craning her neck to glance intro mirrors, or checking other people’s faces to make sure her own was all right.” This quote illustrates the kind of “popular girl” personality she has. Her age also suggests that she in naive compared to others because of her youth. The habit of checking the mirrors and the checking other people’s faces shows that Connie is constantly worried about her impressions on others. This is also exemplified when she compares herself to her sister June, who she seems to envy because she is her mother’s favorite. “She was so plain and chunky and steady that Connie had to hear her praised all the time by her mother and her mother’s sisters.” June is the complete opposite of Connie, being stale and boring, and that provides a contrast that is necessary to understand the theme. Later in the story the character Arnold Friend is introduced. He wears all black, symbolizing evil, and has a passive aggressive, and manipulative personality that can be seen in his dialogue with Connie. June is necessary in the story to show what it would mean to be truly good, compared to Connie who is easily seduced because of her youth and concern of others opinions of her by, which is represented by Arnold Friend. This is why June is sent to the BBQ and is not the one seduced by Arnold, but Connie is. Her weak personality traits such as vanity are ultimately what led to her going towards Arnold.
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ReplyDeleteEveryone has come from somewhere; we all have roots. Everyone is going somewhere; we all have dreams. In the short story Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? Connie, a young girl. flaunts herself in front of young men. She is very concerned about her looks and dresses provocatively. I think she dresses provocatively in order to get attention from young men; she wants to be attractive to the opposite sex. I think this is evident because she dreams of falling in love. The narrator said,
ReplyDelete"Connie sat with her eyes closed in the sun, dreaming and dazed with the warmth about her as if this were a kind of love, the caresses of love, and her mind slipped over onto thoughts of the boy she had been with the night before and how nice he had been, how sweet it always was, not the way someone like June would suppose but sweet, gentle, the way it was in movies and promised in songs...(4)."
She has this fantasy idea of love. She thinks falling in love will be like the movies portray it to be - warm feelings, butterflies, mystery, and excitement. Love is "sweet" and "gentle."She thinks there is nothing bad with love. She was in love with the idea of love. I think she wanted to be in love, and that is "where she wanted to go." However, she will never get to experience love because of Arnold Friend.
In the story Arnold Friend stalks Connie, and when she is all alone he goes to her house. Then Arnold Friend tells her how he has stalked her, and wants her to be her lover. Connie is scared, but he tells her he won't go in the house unless she tries to use the phone to call for help. Eventually she tries to call her mom, but is unable to. The narrator wrote, "She cried out, she cried for her mother, she felt her breath start jerking back and forth in her lungs as if it were something Arnold Friend was stabbing her with again and again with no tenderness." I think the author is using an allusion to suggest the fact that Arnold Friend is going to hurt her and take away her innocence. I think that is why at the end he tells Connie, "The place where you come from ain't there anymore, and where you had in mind is cancelled out(11)." Since he took her innocence the "place where [she] came from" wasn't there anymore. She was no longer an innocent child. The love she had in mind for her future was "cancelled out," because he was planning to kill her.
Connie comes from a family in which she is treated poorly, or thinks she is treated this way. Just like every typical teenager, Connie wants nothing to do with her parents or older, boring sister. She feels as if her parents favor her sister June over her since June helps out around the house more and looks perfect in her mother's eyes. Connie is the pretty sister that is all over guys. She is always leaving her friends to get attention from guys, probably due to the lack of attention from her mother. The house in this case, is not a safe place. It is a place where Connie feels that she has to act in a different way to please her family, maybe even considered vulnerable to being judged. This may represent the home as being the women's vulnerability in the hands of a man. What is often thought is that women ask for things with the language of their body and how they dress and that men will do as they please since they are 'asking for it'. The house would definitely represent this due to this quote from Oates, "'But why lock it,' Arnold Friend said gently, talking right into her face. 'It's just a screen door. It's just nothing.'" The screen door of the house helps symbolize the house as women's vulnerability in a man's society. I don't know that Connie really wanted to go anywhere. I think that she just wants to go back to the way it was before Arnold showed up, she regrets things she has done that have gotten her to this place in life and wants to try to get back after realizing what Arnold wants to do to her. I think this is conveyed by the quote, "'The place you come from ain't there no more'" since Arnold says that he would do something to her family so either way she wasn't going to get out of this, but she wishes she could. It has been cancelled out since he has raped her and then proceeded to kill her. The place where she wanted to go was cancelled out. The only place she is going is to the light as suggested by the end, meaning death.
ReplyDeleteIn the short story Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? by Joyce Carol Oates, the quote, “The place where you come from ain't there anymore, and where you had to in mind to go is cancelled out,” (Oates) holds strong symbolism. First of all, it mentions where she has come from, which most literally represents her home and life as she knows it, but also represents the safety net of her parents. Meaning, no matter how much she changes when she goes out (her hair, her clothes, her attitude, etc.) she can always come home to her parents and act like the innocent girl again. There is no pressure to constantly be an oversexualized teen that she enjoys being when she goes out without her parents. Where she wants to go is not exactly a literal place, but more of a figurative place such as adulthood, more specifically, the independence that comes with the transition into adulthood. Connie had been acting like she was much older than she was, and Arnold Friend treated her like she was a mature woman when he spoke with sexual connotations. This search for independence is recurring through the entire story. This is especially obvious when it says, “her walk, which could be childlike and bobbing, or languid enough to make anyone think she was hearing music in her head; her mouth, which was pale and smirking most of the time, but bright and pink on these evenings out; her laugh, which was cynical and drawling at home...but high-pitched and nervous anywhere else…,” (Oates). Finally, this independence is “cancelled out” by Arnold Friend dominating Connie and forcing her to go with him, basically against her will. With Arnold Friend she will not have any independence; everything she does from now on will be exactly what Arnold wants her to do. So, overall, she acted like she was more mature than she was, and it came back to bite her when someone comes and takes advantage of her, more accurately, immature nature and took away any chance of her having a life full of free will and choices.
ReplyDeleteConnie is from a town typical of the era. It has an emerging cultural identity, with the suburbs, shopping mall, and the like. These were all things teenagers were able to enjoy. The home of Connie is meant to symbolize the oppressive establishment built over Connie. However, as Arnold points out, it may not do much to protect her. "This place you are now – inside your daddy's house – is nothing but a cardboard box I can knock down any time." Her entire family seems to cause her trouble, and she desperately wants a change in her life. She wanted to go somewhere with somebody that would free her from her oppressive life at home, and fulfill her sexual desires. It kind of became canceled out because of Arnold Friend. He seemed at first like somebody Connie would have enjoyed, but he eventually began to creep her out and she wanted him to leave her alone. However, he mentally broke her and convinced her to join him for a "car ride". Connie is meant to represent an outsider-teenager, wanting to break from the life meant for her, one that her sister June has for instance. June represents the ideal life for a young woman back then: helping at home, having a simple job like secretary, and not causing any trouble are all roles she meets well. Arnold Friend as a whole represents how women are meant to be oppressed and physically and mentally controlled by men, per the view of the time. While all men are certainly not like Arnold, the message he serves to convey does apply to the male role of the 1950s/60s.
ReplyDeleteConnie has come from two separate worlds in a way. "Everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one that was for anywhere that was not home: her walk, which could be childlike and bobbing, or languid enough to make anyone think she was hearing music in her head; her mouth, which was pale and smirking most of the time, but bright and pink on these evenings out; her laugh, which was cynical and drawling at home - 'Ha, ha, very funny,' - but highpitched and nervous anywhere else, like the jingling of the charms on her bracelet." When she goes out with her friend behind her parents' back she flirts with boys and likes that men find her attractive. At fifteen she desperately wants this attention, but because she's so young she isn't as mature as she thinks she is. At home, she is able to be childish and immature and when she is out with her friends she transforms into a giggling flirty girl trying to develop her sexuality. Because her parents don't know about her alternate personality, she is careful not to let those two worlds collide. The combination of the music she listens to and the experiences she has while she goes to the drive-in restaurant give her an idea of romance and maturity that she wants to find but typically is only developed through age. When Arnold Friend comes to Connie's house, she is getting the attention from men that she craves, but this causes her home life and her social life to merge and though she tries to keep control of the situation and act indifferently she eventually breaks down and gives in to Arnold's demands. This forces her to mature in a violent way that she isn't ready for.
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