Homework 9/24

3. In Joyce Oates' "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been," there are two primary characters. One is the protagonist, Connie, and the other the antagonist named A. Friend. This short story opens with a brief description of Connie's life. It describes how Connie feels she is somewhat living in the shadow of her 'perfect' older sister. Her older sister is always doing exactly what her parents want her to do and Connie is much more selfish. Connie is always looking in the mirror and putting hairspray and doing things to try to enhance her image of herself. She obviously has a confidence problem and ends up trying to use boys to boost her self confidence. She does not think she is beautiful and thinks that by attracting boys and messing around with them that she is getting the love she apparently does not receive from her family. A. Friend sees Connie out with another boy one night and tells her that she is going to be his. He shows up at her house several days later when Connie's family has traveled to a picnic at her aunt's. It is obvious that Friend has been stalking Connie since he not only knows her name but also where her family is and what they are doing. He also knows what she has been up to these last few days with all the boys she has been with. It is obvious that Friend is crazy, constantly saying that Connie is his girl and that they are going to have a great time on their date that they were supposed to be having on this day. Not to mention the fact that he is stalking her. Eventually Connie gets tired of Friend, but he will not leave until he gets his date with Connie. After many threats by Friend and lots of crying by Connie, she finally agrees to get into the car and the story ends, leaving the reader to only assume the worst. Connie drives all the action in the story. Everything happens because of Connie and her actions. A. Friend wants to be with Connie. He pursues Connie from halfway through the story until the end. We know nothing about Friend really except for that he is a crazy stalker who has probably done this to multiple women.
3. Connie begins to question Friend almost immediately when he arrives at her house. Although, I would say that her initial questioning is not because she is alarmed or spooked by some random guy coming to see her, but more as a formality to see what he is doing here and also, as the story mentions, because she has no idea if she likes this guy. Connie does not start becoming alarmed in her questioning until Friend starts telling her he's not going to leave and he knows that her parents are at a barbecue. She does not know what to do. She goes inside and threatens to call the cops but Friend tells her that he wont come inside unless she touches the phone and then he will. He says that she wont like it if he has to come inside. She is very confused. She has no idea what to do and has thoughts racing through her head. Thoughts about doing dishes and cleaning the table. She is also confused about who she is. She knows she should or could be like her sister, highly respected and praised by her parents. Something inside of her wants to rebel and be different but now she is seeing the dark side of doing such things. Of going out when you're too young to be out alone, especially when you're a female. She thinks she is ready to be grown up, to be loved and in love with another, but she is not. She is still just a confused little girl who is trying to act big. So in the end, she does what she thinks a big girl should do and owns up to her mistakes of going out and lying and misbehaving and goes with Friend.
3. In my version of this story it does not end with Connie getting into A. Friend's car. Connie gets in and the story continues. She is taken by A. Friend to a place outside of the town they are in. It is a remote place, a field where no one can see them or hear them. Connie is forced out of the car by Friend so they can continue their 'date' outside of the car. Connie keeps refusing to get out, but Friend says he wont take her back home if she doesn't. Of course, Connie complies. They sit on a blanket in this desolate field and Friend begins telling her how beautiful she is. He keeps bringing up, as he did earlier, how they are lovers and finishes all his sentences by calling her 'Honey'. Friend tells her that it wont last long. Connie begins to think of her family and all the things she could have done to be a better daughter. How she could have been nicer to her mother and helped her out more often. How she could have tried to get along with her sister better and how she should have listened to her father more. She prayed that as soon as this was over, she would do all those things to make things with her family better. For the first time, she could not wait to see her sister's face. She wouldn't see it again though. The last thing she would see was Arnold's face, standing over her's, shoveling dirt.
3. The setting in Oates' "Where Are You Going" is perfect for the story she is trying to tell. In each setting in the story there is not much detail about the area. The reader does not know if Connie is in the city or a small town or suburb or what. Oates describes the burger joint in very vague terms. Oates gives a brief description of Connie's home, but again it is very vague. The reason she does this is so any reader can identify with the story. She is almost begging the reader to insert their own setting here. This helps the reader to further identify with the characters and what is going on because it is then easier for them to visualize the situation. If Oates had gone on to give great detail to the burger joint, it would be harder for the reader to think that Connie could be at the local burger joint in the reader's town. Oates does this and wants the readers to be able to associate themselves more with this story and setting because this story is like a big lesson. It is a lesson about trying to figure out who you want to be and also about how one does not need to try to get self worth by trying to attract the opposite sex. In stories where an author is trying to get the reader to learn a lesson, it is easier for a reader to fall into a story and understand how they might be susceptible to this behavior if they are able to visualize themselves in the story. That is why, I believe, Oates used such vague and nondescript ways of describing her settings.