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Analysis Of Connie By Joyce Carol Oates

952 Words4 Pages

Joyce Carol Oates writes about a self-absorbed girl named Connie and her experience with Arnold Friend. During the summer, Connie uses the excuse of going to the shopping plaza with her friends to meet boys at a restaurant. During these risky evenings, Connie becomes very flirtatious while away from her family. At the restaurant one evening, Connie’s need for sexuality attracts the attention of a stranger named Arnold Friend without realizing it. The next day, Arnold shows up at her house to take her on a drive. Connie becomes less like herself as Arnold talks about taking her to a field. To stop his threats of hurting her family, she decides to go with him even though she feels uneasy (369-84). Oates shows through Connie’s personality change that teenagers want to break society’s morals on innocence, which ultimately leads to the demise …show more content…

Nancy Dessommes, a literary critic, writes that “Connie thinks of little beyond maintaining her own good looks, impressing boys, and living for the excitement of the moment” (435). Since she spends the day fantasying about boys, Connie does have a diminishing relationship with her family, especially her mother and sister. She is constantly going against her mother to prove that she is not following social views on teenage sexuality. She acts out because “she prefers peer approval to parental and depends on it for her identity” (Dessommes 435). Her ego depends on approval from her friends and potential romantic partners to further her breaking out of her innocent image. Connie is living two lives, and at home she tries to hide her flirty, carefree personality from her family. She changes the way she looks and dresses to attract boys when she is out with friends. She knows this will break social norms, but she fails to think of the danger that comes with her expressing sexuality in

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Arnold Friend’s sudden appearance in Connie’s life takes her from childhood to adulthood in the blink of an eye and she ultimately becomes a passive victim. Not many fifteen-year-old girls are considered mature at that age and Connie is certainly no exception to that. She is presented as quite vain in her views of herself and those around her. Her mother, once a beauty herself, is constantly nagging at her and telling her to stop gawking at herself in the mirror. Connie considers her older sister June to be somewhat of a spinster who is described as “plain and chunky” (Oates

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The movie “Smooth talk” has a related vision to human trafficking. The story introduces Connie, an ordinary, fifteen-year old, attractive teenager who seems to be very naïve. She is engrossed with her appearance and her mother scolds her for it and proceeds to tell her that she should be more like her older sister. Due to the constant scolding from her mother and praising towards her sister, Connie does not get along with them. The only thing she is thankful for is the fact that she is able to go out with friends and meet boys since her sister goes out also.

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Living “just an ordinary girl’s” life was no longer the lifestyle for a girl named Connie. Once a man told her that she was gonna be his, her life turned. Connie was no longer able to forget about reality instead she was forced into adulthood by a man named Arnold Friend. Connie is the main character in the short story, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?”, by Joyce Carol Oates. The story is mainly about how Arnold Friend, a sort of stalker of Connie’s, comes to her house.

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Suddenly, Oates allows Arnold’s malicious side to peak through ever so slightly after Connie tells him that he and is friend better leave, and Arnold replies “We ain’t leaving until you come with us.” (6) In the beginning of the story, the author writes that Connie has two different sides and now she is showing that Arnold has two different ones as well. At this point, Arnold begins to threaten to come in the house if Connie tries to call for help. He even indicates that if she doesn’t go with him before her family returns he will harm them.

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However, this is countered when Connie notes that “he was much older—thirty, maybe more” (315), a fact that frightens her. What Arnold is to Connie is a challenge of her want to be an adult, and a trail of her ability to deal with adult issue. Such as a man who singles her out sexual reason. Her wish to be an adult is something she seeks while passively avoiding it. Her avoidance is marked by day dreams of puppy love romance, like a typical teenager; yet, her attractive flaunt to be mature is presented as if she seeks to be an

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Arnold Friend was there to take Connie away; away from her childhood and home, which never quite felt like home until her fantasy world deteriorated and reality set it. The next moment is pivotal, this is when Connie forgets her hedonism and becomes something of much more substance. Before Connie studies Arnold Friend’s abnormal personality and erratic behavior she is fascinated by him and even worries that she is ill prepared for this

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Oates’s biography explained her fiction writing as a mixture violence and sexual obsession. The writing style definitely fits the plot point of this story with both of her literary ingredients being present in not only Arnold Friend but in Connie as well. The Protagonist Connie is presented in a very self-centered way. She is obsessed with her looks and often fantasizes about all the boys she meets.

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“But now her looks were gone and that was why she was always after Connie.” (Oates ). Also, there is another opportunity for friendship within the family, between Connie and her sister, however, that is lost in their rivalry and hostility. “Her sister 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.” ( ).

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That also made her become more vulnerable to the real dangers and the evilness that exists in the world. That danger was represented by an old man who pretends to be an eighteen year old boy that seduced and kidnaped Connie. The end of the story Joyce Carol Oates leaves it open to the readers, because that way it makes the reader think of what might have happened, whether she got raped or whether she is killed, after the main character leaves with the antagonist of the story. Oates shows that ignorance, narcissism and the lack of

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Like most teenagers she is thinking only in the moment and what is going to please her. Basically Connie and her friend go to a restaurant and this creepy guy named Eddie came in to talk with them, obviously Connie isn’t thinking straight and she leaves the restaurant with this stranger Eddie. Leaving her friend behind. In the book she states “I just hate to leave her like that” (Oates, 391).

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Due to her poor relationship with her family, Connie did not want to ever be around them. In the story is says that during summer vacation she went out “several times a week” (87) with her friend. Then on what appears to be Connie’s last day alive, she refuses to go to a picnic with her family and ends up meeting Arnold Friend and Ellie Oscar, who eventually will take her

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“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been,” is about a teenager named Connie who is trying to come to terms with her transformation from childhood to adulthood. Through this process, Connie attempts to act older than she is an tries to gain the attention of boys. In “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been,” Joyce Oates portrays Connie as obsessed with men to symbolize how one’s obsession and narcissistic attitude can cause danger to seem surreal. In the short story, Carol Oates describes Connie as having two different personalities, one being a narcissistic attitude.

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In her short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?", Joyce Carol Oates utilizes a variety of literary devices to strengthen the story in its entirety. This short story is essentially about a 16-year-old girl named Connie and the conflict between her desire to be mature and her desire to remain an adolescent. Throughout the story, the audience sees this conflict through her words in addition to through her behavior. The audience is also introduced to Arnold Friend, a rather peculiar man, who essentially kidnaps her. This short story by Joyce Carol Oates functions and is additionally meaningful because of her usage of literary devices.

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When Connie realizes that Arnold is much older than she thought, she is taken over by fear of what’s going to happen. This situation is much different than anything else she has ever

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This interpretation of the story explains how Connie simply fell prey to the common theme of men acting as predators in society. Therefore, Connie had no say in her fate, so she just decided to go quietly with him. However, this theory completely disregards the psychological disorders that Connie has. Connie did not go quietly with Arnold because he was a dominating male. Instead, Connie left due to her numerous unconscious mental problems.

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