The story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” by Joyce Carol Oates is captivating and incredibly eerie. Reading it felt as if I was watching a movie and yelling at the girl on screen to turn around and run away.
The story seems to represent a young girl being groomed: manipulated by an older man to coerce her into agreeing to mental abuse.
“I took a special interest in you, such a pretty girl, and found out all about you—like I know your parents and sister are gone somewheres and I know where and how long they’re going to be gone, and I know who you were with last night, and your best girl friend’s name is Betty. Right?” There is a terrifying aspect to this quote. Immediately, as the reader you might see flashing neon red flags, yet Connie is just confused.
Connie, although doing so hesitantly, is cooperating at first. It starts to seem like he almost has her convinced and then things escalate. After the escalation, Connie is defeated.
This quote, “She was hollow with what had been fear but what was now just an emptiness. All that screaming had blasted it out of her.” is representing, to me, a victim fighting until they cannot fight anymore. At this point in the story, this is clear because Connie is now beginning to do everything Arnold says.
The next few lines in the end of the story point to the victim being estranged from family and being convinced that it is okay.
“… Be nice to me, be sweet like you can because what else is there for a girl like you but to be sweet and pretty and give in?—and get away before her people come back?
”She felt her pounding heart. Her hand seemed to enclose it. 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 thing 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.”
One thought on “Sophia Morales Discussion 14”
I like how you used quotes after every analysis almost as if to help the readers understand certain parts of the reading as well as proving your point. I agree with your first point on Connie being succumbed to the mental abuse Arnold Friend was causing her. He tries to make it seem to her as if he has been around her always and knows a lot about her, as if she would find comfort in that without knowing him. Towards the end of the story, he does it again and this time manipulates her by saying in order for her family to be okay, she has to leave with him.