Joyce Carol Oates

An Analysis of Arnold Friend as an Evil Character in Joyce Carol Oates' Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? Joyce Carol Oates presents a description of an adolescent girl's disaffection with her family and rape by Arnold Friend in the short story "Where are You Going, Where Have You Been?" Throughout the story the reader watches Connie, the central character, reject her family, friends and self in an attempt to deny her youth …

…Oates creates a frightening, malevolent character by placing the reader into the mind of a teenager and then destroying this world. The entire character of Arnold Friend is designed to exploit Connie's weaknesses and replace reckless adolescence with disembodied fear. Work Cited Joyce Carol Oates. "Where are You Going, Where Have You Been." Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. Ed. X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. 2nd Compact ed. New York: Longman, 2000. 466-479