Joyce Carol Oates'Story

Joyce Carol Oates' story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" moves from a precise, particularized account of a young girl's restless interest in boys to an encounter with sexual demand in which the stifling terror mounts relentlessly to a conclusion in which the world outside the girl's backdoor has become a land that she "had never seen before and did not recognize" (54). The account of Connie's growing terror is resolved as she gives in to Arnold Friend and, acceding to his demands, leaves the false security of her parents' house and goes out to meet her unstated, dreaded fate. The nature of this encounter is never made perfectly clear but its sexual content and the feeling of terror are unambiguous.

The end of the story is both clear and highly ambiguous and the story has produced critical responses that range from Sullivan's comment that "there are to my knowledge no symbols here" (8) to Creighton's suggestion that Oates invites the reader "to see Arnold Friend as the Arch Fiend, the Devil-in-disguise" (118). But, whether the story is highly symbolic or not, its effects are achieved through the contrast between the naturalistic presentation of detail and atmosphere and the intrusion of elements that transform the atmosphere from benign to menacing. As Creighton notes, one of Oates' great skills as a writer is the ability to sketch the interior and exterior lives of her characters, "place them in vividly specific contexts, and clinically record the mounting

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tial feeling of being vaguely pleased and intrigued by Friend's arrival into growing fear that eventually leaves her defenseless and acquiescent. In essence what happens in the course of the encounter is that Friend manages to convince Connie herself of the inevitability of what is going to happen. This symbolizes the girl's awareness, usually repressed in the glow of the "pure pleasure of being alive," that the knowledge she seeks may not be as pleasurable, as empowering, or as uncomplicated as her carelessly arranged dates with anonymous boys (37). Underneath all her bravado Connie experiences deep fears about what is to come--even as she rushes toward it. But the details of Friend's visit generate the ambiguity involved in the story. He is glimpsed by Connie in the parking lot on one of her visits to the restaurant at precisely the moment where she feels happiest and most sure of herself while walking out with the boy she has met. The "boy with shaggy black hair, in a convertible jalopy painted gold" is unknown to her and his laughing taunt, "Gonna get you baby," is unspecific (37). His reaction to her is that of someone experienced who sees through Connie at that moment and his taunt is addressed at her confidence and

Category: Literature - J