Joyce Carol Oate's Where Is Here: An Analysis

Once when I was about five, I was alone in my room coloring in my Hot Wheels coloring book. Then as I was picking up the Yellow Crayon, at the corner of my eye, I see a small little shadow just creep my cabinet in front of me. I quickly got up and ran towards my parent’s room with my coloring book, and I looked behind me and I saw that shadow running after me. As I was running, I stumbled over my own foot and fell. I couldn’t do anything but start crying. As I was crying, I figured out that my cat was just chasing me. That day had quickly transformed from a fun day full of coloring to a scary chase. Transformation obviously create fear. This can be seen in the following three stories as well. Oate’s “Where is Here” Arthur Tress’ “Dream Collector” and Julio Cortazar’s “House Taken Over” uses transformation of an ordinary person and an ordinary setting to show us how easily circumstances can change. Joyce Carol Oates’ “Where is Here’s” transformation scares readers because it shows that the house changed but the couple changed with it. This is effective because this shows the reader that the couple’s relationship just changed right after the house

It is effective because each picture is different from one another and show different types of fear. For instance, “Photo 3: Young Boy and Hooded Figure, New York, 1971”(84). This shows that this is a type of fear because it shows uncertainty. Readers find this scary because the readers don’t know who the hooded figure is and why the hooded figure is holding on the child. Another example is “Photo 5: Girl With Mask, Rhineback, 1972” (85). In this picture, a small little girl has a gnome mask on and she looks like she is walking up the stairs. This just gives readers a sense of fear. Therefore, transformation was effective because there were multiple images that all represented