Where Are You Going Where Have You Been?

There are many interpretations of Joyce Carol Oates’s short story Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been? The interpretations share a common theme; the Connie ultimately makes the final choice where her fate is concerned. Whatever differences there might be in the interpretation of her motives, her conscious decision to go with Arnold Friend is not questioned. One can question if she were kidnapped at all since that would entail being forced to go against her will or without her knowledge of what was happening. Connie had reached a critical point in her youth where she wanted more than what her hometown could offer, but didn’t yet realize the consequences of all her choices. Connie made the choice to leave with Arnold Friend in spite of his threats, not because of them.

Connie had been seduced by the music of the 1960’s long before Arnold Friend entered the picture. Her boredom with her home life was highlighted only by the nights she was allowed to join her friend in teenage cavorting. Frequently Oates points out how important the music was to Connie. The night before Connie met Arnold, her girlfriend and she “listened to the music that made everything so good: the music was always in the background, like music at church service; it was something to depend upon” (Oates, Where 210). When she reminisces about the boys she has met, she doesn’t think of their faces individually but as “an idea, a feeling, mixed up with the urgent insistent pounding of the music and the humid night air of July” (Oates, Where 210). To her, the music was a way to escape what she considered to be a boring life. When she was in her room alone the day of the barbeque, she “bathed in the glow of slow-pulsed joy that seemed to rise mysteriously out of the music itself” (Oates, Where 211).

In addition to these, there are several other instances in the story where Oates illustrates the joy Connie feels when she is left to her own devices and listening to her music. She is...