Please discuss anything in “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” that particularly interested you. Here are some prompts to get you started thinking:
- Who or what is Arnold Friend? Why does Connie seem particularly vulnerable to him?
- Who do you find the most and least sympathetic character in the story?
- Discuss the religious references in the story.
- Discuss the role of music in the story.
- Choose a quote from the story that stands out to you and discuss its importance.
- How do you think this story fits into the mode of the Female Gothic?
I think one of the most interesting aspects of this story is Connie’s relationship with her mother. The story starts out by describing their relationship. Connie’s mother nags her, and often comments on how she wishes Connie was more like her sister June. Connie even spends her summer voiding her mother’s questions. But when Connie goes for the phone the text states ” She began to scream into the
phone, into the roaring. Sine cried out, sine cried for her mother, she felt her breath start[ jerking back
and for[h in her lungs as if it were something Arnold Friend was stabbing her with again and again
with no tenderness.”. This was interesting to me because her mother was the first person she called out to. Even with her previous resentment towards her Mom, she’ll still call out to her.
There is something very interesting happening at the very beginning of this short involving Connie’s relationship with her mother, herself and with mirrors. Connie’s sense of self is initiated with a past tense introduction, alluding to her ego death at the end of the story. Out of every possible way of introducing her/describing her, Oates chose to start her off in the mirror checking not only her own reflection, but everyone’s reflection. It’s important that, at this moment, Connie’s mother says “who are you?” displaying their distanced relationship and raising the question to the reader; who is she? Who am I? Connie’s hyper awareness of appearance advances a difficult question in the story. Having Connie check everyone from the mirror instead of in real life suggests how everyone loosely reflects her own self, (she can see right through her mother in a shadowy vision of herself). In fact, it was her looks alone that attracted Arnold in the first place. There’s a common theme between Connie and her mother that I believe harmed both of them by the end of the story. Arnold can be read as a reflection of Connie, hence the obsession with her. In Connie’s case, she failed to recognize her sense of self, including personality and awareness. In her mother’s case, she failed to relate to her daughter. I can assume she thought poorly of herself, causing her to reprimand Connie for doing the same things she used to do. There is a common lack of self love/acceptance between mother and daughter that kills them both in the end.
I thought that this short story was actually the “scariest” piece we read in class. In my opinion I think that Connie’s mom was the least sympathetic character in the novel. She was closed towards Connie, and I think if she had been more open, Connie might even had tried to tell her mom about the weird first encounter she had with him. Her mother seemed very neglectful towards Connie from the little it said about her, which also ties the story into the gothic novel genre. the story has very normal qualities of a teenage girls life in it, and then it takes a terrible twist, which made the story all the more scary to me.
I think this story is very interesting and scary. First of all, I find Connie’s mother to be the most unsympathetic character in the story because she often neglects Connie and allows her to fall into bad situations such as the one with Arnold being at her house. Connie’s absent parents definitely help create the theme of the female gothic. I was also wondering about what Arnold could be. Like he doesn’t exactly seem like any typical kidnapper and such because he knows so much; he could possibly be a stalker or an old ex family friend (this would make sense because he’s so much older than Connie), but also he could be some sort of supernatural figure? Which, again gives the story such a female gothic feel because of the bordering-on-supernatural type of antagonist. I think Connie is especially vulnerable to Arnold because no one else is giving her any attention, her mother only makes passive-aggressive to rude comments to her, her father is kinda absent, and her sister is pretty much there as her mother’s human trophy, so that makes her an easier target because she just wants someone to talk to. I also found Arnold’s car to be interesting, like I would love to know what all the writing on it means.
This story was so creepy. There were so many connotations of Arnold Friend being some sort of non-human figure. In terms of the religious connotations, Arnold Friend symbolizes the devil I’m assuming? What a devastating and realistic way to portray a child predator, the literal devil. In this sense, I believe the way Oates wrote the chilling character was effective. His shoes didn’t fit right, his sunglasses resting on a wig, a mask on his face, these are all disturbing things that Connie noticed about him. I thought it was interesting how Connie recognized different voices that he would borrow. I’m interested to learn more about Oates intent for the story, what morals she sought out to convey. In my mind, this story uses a good amount of elements from the Female Gothic genre: difficult family relationships, “absent” or quiet father, connoting the supernatural. I wonder if the ending was made to seem like she was taken to hell because she had no choice? The unfamiliar land she saw past his shoulder was where she was taken to. Chills!
I enjoyed this story a lot. It deeply unsettled me and had me careening and googling answers at the end. I can relate a lot to Connie and also the situation she is put into. It is scary to think how vulnerable and impressionable we are at that age, and just how easily people can take advantage of that. That being said, I am both confused and in awe of this story. The ending was so confusing. Is this something real that is happening, and is it something realistically sinister, like a human trafficker, or something supernatural? Friend seemed to know things he shouldn’t know, like what Connie’s family was doing at that very moment (assuming he wasn’t just lying and manipulating). Connie also describes Friend’s face as a mask, and his body was bent unusually. I imagine him as a very terrifying image, his skin and hair slipping, speaking nonsense and wobbling all bent.
This story was the scariest one yet for me. I kind of assumed Connie was going to be murdered or something like it from the beginning, because the line “Her name was Connie” sounded too much like the introductions of victims on the Serial Killers podcast I listen to. Even still, I don’t know if this is a bad thing, but I actually kind of related to her character (especially in regards to her relationship with her mother), so it was really crushing to see it end that way. I think the parallel of Connie having two sides–one for home and one for anywhere else–and then Arnold Friend also being very two-sided–with the way he would switch from being charming to threatening–was very interesting and chilling. I think the main difference between the opposing sides of the two characters, however, was the alternative presence of evil or innocence. Obviously, Arnold Friend was hiding something sinister beneath his charm, while Connie was just a young girl trying to learn how to navigate the world. I think it says a lot of interesting things about naivety, manipulation and perception, and reality versus fantasy.
This story was one I felt like fit well into the female gothic genre, but was definitely different and more modern than some of the other stories we’ve read. It was creepy, because it had elements of an average teenager girls life with a scary twist. I felt like it would be made into a good movie or show. Connie starts out as a pretty normal teenage girl who defies her moms concerns and just want to be out partying and act sexually appealing to men. This ends up leading her down a bad path with Arnold Friend. He starts out as a creep older guy encounter out in public. Then, it becomes more serious when he shows up at her house, and claimed to be her soulmate. When she continued to deny him, he became more aggressive toward Connie. He used his power to terrify her into complying. He knew her name, where her family was, and other personal details. He threatened to kill them if she didn’t leave with him, and he even admitted to killing the neighbor. In the end, it shows she truly loved her family/ mother to go along with him.
Hey Bella I think it might have actually been made into a movie 😀
Music is a symbol that appears several times within the short story, as it appears both physically blaring out of radios from all around, as well as metaphorically through the way in which the characters think, speak, and even act (or better yet, perform). Throughout the story, music entrances Connie, serving as a form of escapism from her normal life as she daydreams about boys and romance like that within the music on the radio, therefore music seems to represent Connie’s youthful joy, and her curiosity about adult sexuality. However, it becomes increasingly clear that Connie’s idea of adult sexuality is skewed by the romantic ideas from popular music that, to me, likely represents a society that grooms young girls by offering them unrealistic ideas of womanhood and sexuality. This is shown in her interaction with Arnold Friend, a character who uses a similar tone of romance and catchiness to the music that Connie enjoys in order to lure her into his trap. Furthermore, as their discussion continues, Connie begins to see through Arnold’s smooth words and musical tone to uncover the reality of adult sexuality which he presents to her. The fear that she experiences as she faces this reality further exposes Connie’s true inexperience with sexuality, as well as exposes the falseness of the music’s romantic qualities. In summary, I believe that music in this short story is a motif that likely represents pop culture and more specifically how it romanticizes adult sexuality and grooms young girls to expose themselves to and participate in it at a dangerously young age.
This story is actually so creepy and chilling. I think this story fits into the female gothic genre because Connie is the one that has been outcast from her family and she has to sneak around to be able to do what she wants. Connie is quite vain as we can see but I sympathize with her because I think she uses that as a front to hide her true feelings about her mother. She probably seeks her mother’s approval so much and the only reason that she can think of that her mother criticizes her is because Connie is prettier than her and she wants to degrade her. Arnold Friend just gets even creepier as the story goes on, especially when connie says it looks like he is wearing a wig and he is standing taller in his boots, also that he is probably like 30. Connie might seem particularly vulnerable to him because he is much older and knows that she is seeking validation, which he is willing to give. However, ask Connie gets more noticeably freaked out, Arnold becomes hostile and begins to relish in the power that he has by making Connie scared and uncomfortable. Also, when Arnold threatened Connie’s family she could not bear him saying that which shows that she truly does care for her family, even if she acts like she does not.
A quote that stuck out to me the most states, “Everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one 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…but high-pitched and nervous anywhere else…” This quote is important because it describes the two sides to Connie. When she’s at home, she can be childish and immature. When she’s out of the house she tries to be sexy and mature. She acts like a woman out in public, but argues with her mother and sister at home, where no one sees her. This indicates some insecurity in her personality, because she puts on a front about who she really is. She doesn’t have the confidence to have one personality as a strong woman and it brings out the fact that she is still immature, but hides it when she wants to. She hasn’t fully formed into the woman she wants to be and is unsure about who she really is.