Where Are You Going Where Have You Been Summary

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“Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” is a very interesting and kind of chilling story by Carol Oates. In it tells about a young girl named Connie who is very attractive to boys and she knows this and takes advantage by using her looks. She doesn’t have the best relationship with her family because of her lack of communication. When Connie is in her house with her family she is not the same Connie she is outside of her home. She is more woman like and tries to flaunt her beauty by walking a certain way and even flipping her hair. Connie wants attention from older men and finally when she gets it she is scared and does not know what to do. Throughout the story we see the duality of her personalities and the arrival of Arnold Friend at her …show more content…
As the story progresses Connie is left home alone and Arnold shows up to her house. This is what causes Connie to become confused by her personalities. Now that a boy is at her house she is unsure of how to act while she is at home. She begins to flirt with him but is reluctant to let him in. In this part of the story you can really see her starting to be confused and scared. Once Arnold Friend reveals that he is not a boy at all and Connie puts two and two together is when she starts to worry and she no longer wants to be mature. Connie has always wanted to be mature and to become a woman, the irony is that Arnold is trying to make her mature and become a woman but Connie no longer wants this. She is terrified of him and she regrets acting like a woman but now she must. It is as if she never appreciated her innocence and now she will not have it any longer. (Where Are You Going Where Have You Been."Death and Reality in Where Are You Going,Where Have You Been? by Joyce Carol )The duality of her two personalities is what comes together as an end result to her being lured by Arnold out of her house, Connie’s innocence dies as well as her split personality. She can no longer hide that other self and it is forced to come out by Arnold Friend and at the end of the story her innocence is what dies while her maturity that she always wanted is
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