"Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"
A Short Story by Joyce Carol Oates
About the Author
Joyce Carol Oates was born on June 16th, 1938 in Lockport, New York. Her childhood was spent on her parent's farm during the Great Depression, where she showed a great interest in reading and writing. Her grandmother gave her a typewriter when she was fourteen, and she wrote "novel after novel" throughout high school and college. Oates's skill as a writer earned her a spot on her school newspaper and a scholarship to attend Syracuse University. She majored in English and graduated Syracuse as valedictorian of her class. In 1962 she moved to Detroit, Michigan to teach at the University of Detroit, where she encountered the social turmoil and crime engulfing American cities; these issues formed much of her early fiction, such as "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?," which she published in the literary magazine Epoch in 1966. Currently Oates has written 56 novels, over 30 collections of short stories, and eight volumes of poetry, plays, essays, and book reviews. She received the PEN/Malamud award for a "lifetime of literary achievement" in 1996, and presently serves as Princeton University's Distinguished Professor of Humanities. RLS
Relation to "Becoming an Adult"
Joyce Carol Oates's piece "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" perfectly embodies the awkward and sudden transition to adulthood teenagers face when growing up. Connie impersonates what she believes is an adult due to media influence, but Arnold Friend shows her she is not ready to grow up by treating her like a woman and not the High School Sophomore she actually is. RLS
An Excerpt From "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"
He shaded his eyes and peered in at Connie, who was backed against the kitchen table. "Don't mind him, honey, he's just a creep. He's a dope. Right? I'm the boy for you, and like I said, you come out here nice like a lady and give me your hand, and nobody else gets hurt, I mean, your nice old bald-headed daddy and your mummy and your sister in her high heels. Because listen: why bring them in this?" "Leave me alone," Connie whispered. "Hey, you know that old woman down the road, the one with the chickens and stuff—you know her?"
"She's dead!"
"Dead? What? You know her?" Arnold Friend said.
"She's dead—"
"Don't you like her?"
"She's dead—she's—she isn't here any more—"
"But don't you like her,
I mean, you got something against her? Some grudge or something?" Then his voice dipped as if he were conscious of a rudeness. He touched the sunglasses perched up on top of his head as if to make sure they were still there. "Now, you be a good girl."
'What are you going to do?"
"Just two things, or maybe three," Arnold Friend said. "But I promise it won't last long and you'll like me the way you get to like people you're close to. You will. It's all over for you here, so come on out. You don't want your people in any trouble, do you?" She turned and bumped against a chair or something, hurting her leg, but she ran into the back room and picked up the telephone. Something roared in her ear, a tiny roaring, and she was so sick with fear that she could do nothing but listen to it—the telephone was clammy and very heavy and her fingers groped down to the dial but were too weak to touch it. She began to scream into the phone, into the roaring. She cried out, she cried for her mother, she felt her breath start jerking back and forth in her lungs as if it were something Arnold Friend was stabbing her with again and again with no tenderness. A noisy sorrowful wailing rose all about her and she was locked inside it the way she was locked
inside this house.
After a while she could hear again. She was sitting on the floor with her wet back against the wall.
Arnold Friend was saying from the door, "That's a good girl. Put the phone back. She kicked the phone away from her. "No, honey. Pick it up. Put it back right." She picked it up and put it back. The dial tone stopped. "That's a good girl. Now, you come outside." She was hollow with what had been fear but what was now just an emptiness. All that screaming had blasted it out of her. She sat, one leg cramped under her, and deep inside her brain was something like a pinpoint of light that kept
going and would not let her relax. She thought, I'm not going to see my mother again. She thought, I'm not going to sleep in my bed again. Her bright green blouse was all wet. Arnold Friend said, in a gentle-loud voice that was like a stage voice, "The place where you came from ain't there any more, and where you had in mind to go is cancelled out. This place you are now—inside your daddy's house—is nothing but a cardboard box I can knock down any time. You know that and always did know it. You hear me?"
She thought, I have got to think. I have got to know what to do. "We'll go out to a nice field, out in the country here where it smells so nice and it's sunny," Arnold Friend said. "I'll have my arms tight around you so you won't need to try to get away and I'll show you what love is like, what it does. The heck with this house! It looks solid all right," he said. He ran a fingernail down the screen and the noise did not make Connie shiver, as it would have the day before. "Now, put your hand on your heart, honey. Feel that? That feels solid too but we know better. 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." She stood. "Now, turn this way. That's right. Come over here to me.—Ellie, put that away, didn't I tell you? You dope. You miserable creepy dope," Arnold
Friend said. His words were not angry but only part of an incantation. The incantation was kindly. "Now come out through the kitchen to me, honey, and let's see a smile, try it, you're a brave, sweet little girl and now they're eating corn and hot dogs cooked to bursting over an outdoor fire, and they don't know one thing about you and never did and honey, you're better than them because not a one of them would have done this for you."
Connie felt the linoleum under her feet; it was cool. She brushed her hair back out of her eyes. Arnold Friend let go of the post tentatively and opened his arms for her, his elbows pointing toward each other and his wrists limp, to show that this was an embarrassed embrace and a little mocking, he didn't want to make her self-conscious. She put out her hand against the screen. She watched herself push the door slowly open as if she were back safe somewhere in the other doorway, watching this body and this head of long hair moving out into the sunlight where Arnold Friend waited.
"My sweet little blue-eyed girl," he said in a half-sung sigh that had nothing to do with her brown eyes but was taken up just the same by the vast sunlit reaches of the land behind him and on all sides of him—so much land that Connie had never seen before and did not recognize except to know that she was going to it. RLS
Here is a link to an online source with the full story, which can also be found in your textbook:
http://www.usfca.edu/jco/whereareyougoing/
"She's dead!"
"Dead? What? You know her?" Arnold Friend said.
"She's dead—"
"Don't you like her?"
"She's dead—she's—she isn't here any more—"
"But don't you like her,
I mean, you got something against her? Some grudge or something?" Then his voice dipped as if he were conscious of a rudeness. He touched the sunglasses perched up on top of his head as if to make sure they were still there. "Now, you be a good girl."
'What are you going to do?"
"Just two things, or maybe three," Arnold Friend said. "But I promise it won't last long and you'll like me the way you get to like people you're close to. You will. It's all over for you here, so come on out. You don't want your people in any trouble, do you?" She turned and bumped against a chair or something, hurting her leg, but she ran into the back room and picked up the telephone. Something roared in her ear, a tiny roaring, and she was so sick with fear that she could do nothing but listen to it—the telephone was clammy and very heavy and her fingers groped down to the dial but were too weak to touch it. She began to scream into the phone, into the roaring. She cried out, she cried for her mother, she felt her breath start jerking back and forth in her lungs as if it were something Arnold Friend was stabbing her with again and again with no tenderness. A noisy sorrowful wailing rose all about her and she was locked inside it the way she was locked
inside this house.
After a while she could hear again. She was sitting on the floor with her wet back against the wall.
Arnold Friend was saying from the door, "That's a good girl. Put the phone back. She kicked the phone away from her. "No, honey. Pick it up. Put it back right." She picked it up and put it back. The dial tone stopped. "That's a good girl. Now, you come outside." She was hollow with what had been fear but what was now just an emptiness. All that screaming had blasted it out of her. She sat, one leg cramped under her, and deep inside her brain was something like a pinpoint of light that kept
going and would not let her relax. She thought, I'm not going to see my mother again. She thought, I'm not going to sleep in my bed again. Her bright green blouse was all wet. Arnold Friend said, in a gentle-loud voice that was like a stage voice, "The place where you came from ain't there any more, and where you had in mind to go is cancelled out. This place you are now—inside your daddy's house—is nothing but a cardboard box I can knock down any time. You know that and always did know it. You hear me?"
She thought, I have got to think. I have got to know what to do. "We'll go out to a nice field, out in the country here where it smells so nice and it's sunny," Arnold Friend said. "I'll have my arms tight around you so you won't need to try to get away and I'll show you what love is like, what it does. The heck with this house! It looks solid all right," he said. He ran a fingernail down the screen and the noise did not make Connie shiver, as it would have the day before. "Now, put your hand on your heart, honey. Feel that? That feels solid too but we know better. 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." She stood. "Now, turn this way. That's right. Come over here to me.—Ellie, put that away, didn't I tell you? You dope. You miserable creepy dope," Arnold
Friend said. His words were not angry but only part of an incantation. The incantation was kindly. "Now come out through the kitchen to me, honey, and let's see a smile, try it, you're a brave, sweet little girl and now they're eating corn and hot dogs cooked to bursting over an outdoor fire, and they don't know one thing about you and never did and honey, you're better than them because not a one of them would have done this for you."
Connie felt the linoleum under her feet; it was cool. She brushed her hair back out of her eyes. Arnold Friend let go of the post tentatively and opened his arms for her, his elbows pointing toward each other and his wrists limp, to show that this was an embarrassed embrace and a little mocking, he didn't want to make her self-conscious. She put out her hand against the screen. She watched herself push the door slowly open as if she were back safe somewhere in the other doorway, watching this body and this head of long hair moving out into the sunlight where Arnold Friend waited.
"My sweet little blue-eyed girl," he said in a half-sung sigh that had nothing to do with her brown eyes but was taken up just the same by the vast sunlit reaches of the land behind him and on all sides of him—so much land that Connie had never seen before and did not recognize except to know that she was going to it. RLS
Here is a link to an online source with the full story, which can also be found in your textbook:
http://www.usfca.edu/jco/whereareyougoing/
A Clip From the Movie Smooth Talk
This movie bases its story on "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?."
smooth talk2 from Rachel Self on Vimeo.
Found by: RLS
Uploaded by: RLS
Uploaded by: RLS
Discussion Questions and Activities
1. Have students read the excerpt online or in their textbook separately, then watch the movie clip together as a class. Compare and contrast the two pieces and have students explain which one was more effective with presenting characters and Oates's symbolism.
2. Are there important themes present in this piece, or is it just a tale about a girl who is kidnapped from her home? Have students explain the reason behind their answers, or show where they got their ideas in the text.
3. Read this line: "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?" Arnold lists exactly what Connie should do because there is no way she can get away from him; does this view of male dominance create more crimes against females today, or has this perspective decreased over time?
4. What is the significance of the dead woman Arnold Friend references to Connie, or does she not have importance at all?
5. Read the paragraph that begins with: "She turned and bumped against a chair or something...." Have students get into groups of two or three and discuss what they think is happening during this paragraph to Connie, then present their ideas to the class after five minutes.
6. What would the story be like from Ellie Oscar or June's perspective? RLS
2. Are there important themes present in this piece, or is it just a tale about a girl who is kidnapped from her home? Have students explain the reason behind their answers, or show where they got their ideas in the text.
3. Read this line: "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?" Arnold lists exactly what Connie should do because there is no way she can get away from him; does this view of male dominance create more crimes against females today, or has this perspective decreased over time?
4. What is the significance of the dead woman Arnold Friend references to Connie, or does she not have importance at all?
5. Read the paragraph that begins with: "She turned and bumped against a chair or something...." Have students get into groups of two or three and discuss what they think is happening during this paragraph to Connie, then present their ideas to the class after five minutes.
6. What would the story be like from Ellie Oscar or June's perspective? RLS
Essay and Response Questions
1. Oates uses symbolism in her piece to portray different messages about her characters. What is the significance of these symbols to the characters?
2. When coaxing Connie from her house, Arnold speaks about her family, saying: "you're better than them because not a one of them would have done this for you." What is Oates trying to say with this line on the transition from teenager to Adulthood and why is this important to know?
3. Connie feels she knows the adult world and attempts to portray the sensual adult she sees in media, which ultimately led to her kidnapping by Arnold Friend. What type of misconceptions do children have of Adulthood because of media, and how can that negatively effect them later in life?
4. Read "Barn Burning" on pg. 71 in the textbook. What are the differences and similarities between Connie and Sarty's view on independence? How has parental influence affected their view? RLS
2. When coaxing Connie from her house, Arnold speaks about her family, saying: "you're better than them because not a one of them would have done this for you." What is Oates trying to say with this line on the transition from teenager to Adulthood and why is this important to know?
3. Connie feels she knows the adult world and attempts to portray the sensual adult she sees in media, which ultimately led to her kidnapping by Arnold Friend. What type of misconceptions do children have of Adulthood because of media, and how can that negatively effect them later in life?
4. Read "Barn Burning" on pg. 71 in the textbook. What are the differences and similarities between Connie and Sarty's view on independence? How has parental influence affected their view? RLS
Formatting by: RLS