Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been

Improved Essays
In the short story, “No One Is a Mystery” the narrator knelt down to look at her pants after being on the car floor. She describes the dust on her jeans to a butterfly. This description gives the reader an image of a butterfly printed on her jeans made out of dust. The narrator describes it that way because the dust shape on her jeans reminds her of a butterfly. This also, tells us how unclean the car of the floor; so dusty that it took form on her jeans. This description is a metaphor describing the dust of her jeans to a butterfly. In “Where Are you Going, Where Have You Been”, the author explains the way Arnold was naming the kids that he know to Connie. “Listen: Betty Schultz and Tony Fitch and Jimmy Pettinger and Nancy Pettinger,” he said in a chant…” (CP 14). The author summarized the dialogue to indicate that Arnold chanting the names of the kids to show how confident he was. A chant indicates that he was confidently singing out the names of the kids on the block. Letting the reader know how he was saying the kids name to Connie. This also us the type of guy Arnold is, the outspoken cocky type guy. Arnold could have been a guy who is shy but this summarizing dialogue …show more content…
We can conclude without knowing that she started that she was eighteen in the beginning of the story that she was a child. The author uses speech to convey this when her boyfriend tells her that she sound like a child. For asking him why his car was so dirty. Another speech from the girl’s boyfriend "This is my birthday present from him. I can’t imagine anybody more than I love jack” (CH 41). This indicates how hopeless romantic the main character in the story is. She doesn’t see herself loving anyone else because her boyfriend gave her a diary to write about him. This also shows contracting traits that she loves and wants to be with jack which is her

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    Raynise Adams Dr. Kathryn Crowther English 1102 9 September 2014 A Critique of Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been as an Archetypal Tale As children , people are told tales that are meant to entertain and educate. These tales introduce children to the complexities of human behavior when trying to make the right decision. Joyce Carol Oates’ “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” is an archetypal tale about fifteen year old Connie who while in this liminal phase of life makes the wrong decision and chooses to go off into thevast world with Arnold Friend.…

    • 1183 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    So I thought that I could comprehend it easily from a voice of a girl around my age. I could relate to a lot of what was said about it; so I read the novel. Lily is the main character of this book and the narrator through its entirety. She is 14 years old and white.…

    • 494 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The text I composed my questions and theories from is “Where are you Going, Where Have you Been?” Initially, this short story captured my interest through its strikingly, realistic scenarios stemming from the protagonist Connie’s attitude towards her mother and sister along with the secret dates with boys at the diner. This text struck me as an ideal choice because of the ambiguous antagonist, Arnold Friend, this character presents several theories of different meanings explaining what the hidden interpretations the author intended. The questions I will answer are what the potential meanings the Arnold Friend character such as: the similarities and potential referencing to the serial killer Charles Schmidt, the possible symbolism as Arnold friend as the Devil and the comparison of…

    • 1172 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Likewise, in another scene, the narrator stresses that he was becoming more like Arnold. He says, “…I wanted to stay who I was” (Treichel 45). The narrator stresses, he did not want to be like Arnold; he did not want to share his food or room with him (Treichel 45). Further, the threat of Arnold engulfing the narrator’s identity and replacing it with his own is so traumatic, that he suffers from physical symptoms. He is diagnosed with trigeminal neuralgia, which he relates back to his resemblance to Arnold.…

    • 1062 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the short story “Where Are You Going Where Have You Been” by Joyce Carol Oates, the plot revolves around a young narcissist named Connie. Connie is a 15 year old normal teenage girl relatively speaking. She has no interest in responsibility and often dreams of the Disney-like life of a beautiful girl being met by an extraordinary man. Connie’s desire to be rebellious, her desire to be better than others, and her desire to be noticed are the focus of this story. Despite the similarity in these, there are very key differences that reflect the immaturity and indecisiveness of young Connie.…

    • 1710 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Arnold Friend, in Oates story first makes an appearance when Connie meets him in the parking lot and says he’s going to get her. An unusual statement like that foreshadowed what was going to happen later in the story. When Connie started to notice that Arnold isn’t who he says he is given the hints about, his age, how he knows where her parents are, how “evidently his feet did not go all the way down…”, and especially his sweet yet dangerous tone, Connie starts to panic because she realizes she’s trapped inside and has nowhere to go. Knowing that someone like Arnold was coming for her, she released all her fear in a “violent” way which she cried out for her mother and made a decision to give in to Arnold. Similarly in Bob Dylan’s song, he mostly mentions the character’s unbalanced mental state and her decision to end her life.…

    • 1062 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Also in “The Death of a Moth,” Dillard not only continues to use the symbolism of candles throughout the narrative, she also mentions the number of candles or wicks numerically throughout her writing. When on the mountains, Dillard first only refers to “the candle” (7) when the moth begins burning from its flame. Later on, the author writes that the candle the moth continues to fuel “had two wicks, two flames of identical light, side by side” (8). At the very end, Dillard writes “I have three candles here on the table which I disentangle from the plants and light when visitors come” (10). This deliberate use of numbers that are in numerical order throughout the essay seem to suggest progression for the author. This most likely signifies the…

    • 746 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Brandon Siron Anne Henley Rowe ENG 112 27 September 2017 Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been Final Draft In the short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? " Written by Joyce Carol Oates, is a fiction about a rebellious fifteen-year-old girl named Connie. She is obsessed with her appearance and avoids her mother when she tries to tell her that her appearance isn't what's important. Connie wants to get attention from boys until she gets attention from the wrong boy.…

    • 1106 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Anne Dillard’s “The Death of a Moth” is a representation of her view on death. Dillard puts the reader in her shoes when she explains the settings and events that go on around her. Anne Dillard lived a single life with her two cats which were yellow and black. Dillard first opens the reader to a single crustacean, the spider, which she says is intelligent because he is somehow managing to survive as opposed to the bugs that become trapped in its spider’s web under the toilet. Eventually, Dillard comes across multiple corpses on the floor, however, one particular corpse catches her eye.…

    • 1054 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Throughout the stories Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? And A Good Man Is Hard to Find, The theme of fear is present throughout these stories. The ideology of fear are shown in these two stories and they connect to how fear is used to control people. Fear is seen today and was seen in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Both Joyce Carol Oates and Flannery O’Connor emphasized this throughout their stories.…

    • 1129 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    "Where are you going, where have you been?” Is mixture of psychological thriller and coming of age story, written by Joyce Carol Oates, an American author born on June 16, 1938, in Lockport, New York. This short story tells us about Connie, a fifteen year old girl who lives with her mom, her dad and her sister June. Connie is described as a teenager who is constantly preoccupied about her appearance, trying to look desirable and mature. Her dangerous and naive search for maturity and independence will put her in an uncomfortable situation that gives her the opportunity to demonstrate what she has been wanting this whole time: that she is no longer a little girl, that she can act and react as an adult, and that she is independent from her parents, only to realize that she’s scared, nervous and screaming for her mother.…

    • 1098 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” is an eerie short story written by Joyce Carol Oates. The story, published in the fall 1966 edition of Epoch Magazine generated a big buzz (Ptalzgraf 221). Oates dedicated the story to Bob Dylan because she was inspired to write it after listening to his song “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue”(“Where”Shmoop). She was also inspired by the gruesome serial killer Charles Schmid. Joyce Carol Oates most famous short story is “Where Are you Going, Where Have You Been.”…

    • 1100 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    A Home for Maisie 212417193 1 A Home for Maisie 212417193 A Home for Maisie 212417193 2 THE MULTIDIMENSIONAL APPROACH Maisie's behavior can be interpreted in many different ways, for example using the multidimensional approach we find that there are some similarities between Hutchison's definition of Personal dimensions and Maisie. The psychological person consists of cognition, emotion, and self identity (Hutchison 2013). Maisie is very emotionally unstable, and has little sense of identity.…

    • 1894 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?”: An Analysis There are two themes that are central to “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” by Joyce Carol Oates: the theme of independence and the theme of reality vs. fantasy, both of which are relevant in today’s society. Both of these themes are prominent in the interactions between Connie, a precocious fifteen-year-old girl and an ageless “Old Friend”, Arnold Friend, who can be seen as evil, or, the devil. The symbol of music is used as a dissociation from reality.…

    • 1646 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    This shows how long she has kept her emotions to herself due to her loneliness and lack of communication with others on the…

    • 1115 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays