Arnold Friend, the antagonist in Joyce Carol Oates’s story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” represents the devil who arrives to bring Connie to the underworld. For example, his unusual appearance implies that he is an inhuman being, unlike what he wants to lead on. As he struggles to walk from his car to the front door, Connie notes that “his whole face was a mask... tanned down to his throat...as if he had..makeup on..but had forgotten about his throat”(5). Arnold Friend covers his demonic features in order to pass as a teenager with the intention of deceiving Connie into leaving with him.
In Joyce Carol Oats “Where Are You Going Where Have You Been,” we are introduced to two main characters. The names of the two main characters are Connie and Arnold Friend. In Oates’s short story, Arnold Friend is an imposter that tries to convince young Connie to go on a ride with him and his friend Ellie. Connie refuses to go on the ride but Arnold’s use unnatural techniques to force Connie to leave her house and go with him. Arnold Friend’s awareness of Connie’s family and friends and his ability to persuade Connie reveals that he is more than just a creepy old man trying to kidnap a young girl.
In addition, Oates expresses Arnold Friends control over Connie’s body through this quote, “She thought for the first time in her life that it was nothing that was hers, that belonged to her, but just a pounding, living this inside this body that wasn’t really hers either. You don’t want them to get hurt. Arnold Friend went on. Now get up, honey. Get up all by yourself.
[g]et up all by yourself”, Connie realizes she truly has no choices (Oates 11). Connie thinks it is best to go with Arnold Friend because she does not want the burden of her family’s death to be in her hands. Connie exhibits
She has a disturbing idea that arnold friend has no past and no roots. The author expresses this idea by not sharing any background information on Arnold. Unlike Connie, whose history and thoughts are in the story, arnold is not “humanized” or normal making him very mysterious and suspicious
You don’t know what that is but you will” (Oates 6). Friend saw Connie as his sexual object. Connie in her adult persona enjoyed that feeling of being stared at and wanted by a man. On the other hand, teenage Connie still trapped in her body somewhere speculated that Arnold Friend was no teenage boy and he was dangerous with no good
In Joyce Carol Oates’s, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” , fifteen year old Connie is trying to combat the cunning verbal demands of a predator, Arnold Friend, who is aiming to lure her away for his own selfish purpose. Connie was constantly consumed by her thoughts, “Connie couldn’t do a thing, her mind was all filled with trashy daydreams.” (Oates 158) Connie’s constant daydreaming made her vulnerable and open. Connie’s having a predictable mindset; she is easily consumed by Arnold Friend’s soothing incantations, which is evident through his predatory words, and eerie patience all allowed him to control her mind and her body followed.
She states, “She watched herself push the door slowly open as if she were back safe somewhere in the other doorway, watching this body and this head of long hair moving into the sunlight where Arnold Friend waited”(1420). Although she knows that she will not be safe once she opens the door, Connie still leaves with this man who until that day she knew nothing about. Why? This proves that because Connie has let her anxiety and trauma get the best of her she gave into it all, not being able to take the pressure of feeling overwhelmed. Thus, having Friend who has familiar and unfamiliar aspects to him and bring up repressed moments conquer Connie in her fight to leave this in her “unconscious” state of
by Jayce Carol Oats is written with a main theme of reality versus fantasy. The author purposely includes the character Arnold Friend, who appears as a normal middle-aged man but is actually a demonic figure. The author purposely gives Arnold Friend physical characteristics
She watched herself push the door slowly open as if she were back safe somewhere in the other doorway, watching this body and this head of long hair moving out into the sunlight where Arnold Friend waited” (Oates). This displays the severity of the fear that Connie is facing and how it is physically affecting
She sees the boys who give her attention as subjugations who “dissolve into a single face that was not even a face but an idea” (Oates 675). But soon enough her dreams and music materialize into the shape of Arnold Friend. Arnold Friend is described as a muscular, older, and mysterious character. He seems to be a work of her imagination as he is ultimately an idea she created that would fit into her perfect fantasy world. Connie is defenseless to Arnold Friend’s manipulations mainly because she has no visible identity of her own.
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.
As Gretchen Schulz and R.J.R. Rockwood put it, “Toward Arnold friend and what he represents, Connie is ambivalent: she is both fascinated and frightened. She is after all, at that confusing age when girls feels, thinks, and acts both like a child, put off by a possible lover, and like a woman, attracted to him”(577). In other words, Connie’s actions are led by her shallow emotions and desires. Her intuition warns
Joyce Carol Oates’ “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” leads the reader to believe both Connie and Arnold Friend battle with their identity. As Oates begins the story, she introduces Connie as “shallow and vapid” (Slimp); more obsessed with herself to notice the real world around her. Connie had a tendency to look “one way when she was at home and another way when she was away from home” (Oates 1), showing the reader she was two sided. Connie’s need to change her identity based on her location can very much stem from a lack of self-confidence. This can also be seen with Arnold Friend.
Although some may argue that the short story, “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” by Joyce Carol Oates, reveals that Connie’s materialistic ideals drove her actions which caused her ultimate demise, this position limits the importance of Connie’s repressed thoughts. Her repressed thoughts, identified through daydreams and inner dialogue, reveal her psychological efforts to protect herself from the imminent danger ahead. These thoughts form as she strives to achieve a differentiation of self from her older sister, yet her newfound identity becomes superficially based off how she believes she should behave around her peers. When Arnold Friend appears at her doorstep, even though Connie deploys her defense mechanisms of repression and denial, she remains vulnerable to Arnold because she does not acknowledge her repressed thoughts and only considers his superficial appearance. Once Connie’s repressed thoughts surface, her reality anxiety allows her to uncover Arnold Friend’s true intentions with her and shed light on Connie’s fatal flaw: her differentiation of self.
