‘Where are you going, Where have you been?’ is a story of a girl maturing into womanhood. Written and published in the year 1966, this story, according to its author Joyce Carol Oates, was written while she was listening to the song ‘It’s all over now’ by Bob Dylan. (Davidson, 1996) And when we go through the story we see that, music is everywhere in the story. It is used to set the mood for a particular situation, it offers the characters their dialogues and it is just omnipresent in the entire plot. Not just music, but the car, the home of Connie and her habit of seeing her reflection often - all these things act as an allegory, and convey a far greater meaning which one might miss when first reading the story. On closer look all these symbolisms and characterizations has been used by the author, to represent the age old battle of evil vs. good This essay is aimed at identifying such literary elements used by the author and exploring the hidden meaning they might convey the reader.
The plot of the story is concise and describes the life of a teen age girl named Connie. She is a typical adolescent girl, who is always concerned with her looks and constantly bickering with her mother. She is beautiful, while her sister June is plain looking, and Connie is constantly being compared to her sister, in a disapproving way by her mother. She spends her evening with her girl friends and secretly picks up boys in the ‘Big Boy restaurant’. One evening in the restaurant, he meets a stranger who is instantly attracted to her and Connie too feels a strong feeling towards him.
Few days later when her family has gone to a barbeque party leaving Connie alone at home, this stranger turns up in her doorway with a friend. He introduces him selves as Arnold Friend, and asks her to come along for a ride with him in his convertible. At first she finds it amusing and debates internally whether to go or not, all the while playfully chatting with him. Half way through the conversation she realizes that, his intentions are sinister and tries to get rid of him. Then Arnold turns arrogant and subtly warns her that if she calls for help or stall his advances, he will harm her entire family. After a brief period of emotional turmoil, Connie gives in and steps out of her house. The story ends here, leaving the reader to guess the events that unfolds thereafter.
Originally titled as ‘Death and Maiden’, the story reflects the struggle of a fifteen year old girl to escape the fatal attraction of temptations. From the very beginning of the story, duality plays a major role in the plot. While describing Connie, the author stresses the fact that she is a different person at home and an altogether another person outside.
“Everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one for anywhere that was not home”. (Oates, 1966)
The sisters too were diagonally opposite to each other. Connie is pretty but self obsessed, and June is plain but helping her mother with chores, and is more accommodating with the needs of others. So there is duality in the family too. Arnold again is a person with two facets. He is described as a person, who has a tanned face but the rest of his body is not tanned, giving his face a mask like quality. He is an older man trying to behave like a teenage boy, and a shorter person trying to look tall. So everything about him is something on the surface, and an entirely different one on the inside. He uses a lot of pretences to hide the reality of his personality.
This duality strewn across the initial part of the plot sets the stage for the core battle of the story – evil vs. good. The major part of the story is dedicated to the exchange between Connie and Arnold, at the doorstep of her house. This scene reminds us of the famous exchange between Satan and Eve in the Garden of Eden. Arnold’s name too is conspicuous of what he represents. His surname is ‘Friend’, which closely resembles the word fiend, which is a name used to refer the evil or the Satan. His left leg, which is bent at the ankle, might represent the devil which walks with a hoof. He first cajoles, then reasons and finally threatens Connie, into doing something which she is not supposed to do, just like the way Satan induced Eve to eat the fruit of sin. That temptation resulted in Eve being evicted from the Garden into a new land, and here Connie leaves the house without a clue what will happen to her in the future.
“so much land that Connie had never seen before and did not recognize except to know that she was going to it.” (Oates, 1966)
Thus the young girl is shocked into the reality, and finally she matures as a woman by taking the grownups’ decision of, sacrificing herself for the safety of her family. Besides these allegories, Oates’ work has some serious and strong messages, for the society of that period like, how women were expected make sacrifices for family, the threat of rapes and sexual assaults faced by young women, and the dangers of the drug and pop culture that threatened the youth of that era.
Oates is one of the most prolific writers of our time and the response to her works has ranged from tremendous appreciations to callous criticisms. Though nominated twice for the Nobel Prize, Oates also had suffered her share of bad press. (Rhodes, ND) Thus, the duality which is commonly seen in her works clearly was a part of her life too. This short fiction is one of her most anthologized story, mainly because of the many subtle messages the story gives to its reader. While the story has no extensive plot or vivid imagery or other such elements, it truly is a reflection of the culture of that period and a perfect example of a realistic allegory.
Reference List
Davidson, Rob. Dedication of Joyce Carol Oates Short Story to Dylan. April, 1996. Web. October 28, 2013. Retrieved from http://www.edlis.org/twice/threads/joyce_carol_oates_dedication.html
Keilbach, Andreas. The Concept of Duality in Joyce Carol Oates's "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" Norderstedt, Germany: GRIN Verlag, 2009 Print.
Oates, Joy Carol. (1966) Where are you going, Where have you been? Web. October 28, 2013 Retrieved from http://www.d.umn.edu/~csigler/PDF%20files/oates_going.pdf
Rhodes, Bess. (ND) Killing Two Birds with One Stone: Oates’ Figurative and literal Reason behind “Where Are You Going, Where have you been? Watermarks. Web. October 28, 2013. Retrieved from http://androidrootmaster.wordpress.com/tag/where-are-you-going%EF%BC%9Fwhere-have-you-been/
