a materials analysis dissertation
Joyce Carol Oates characteristics the creation of “Where Are You Heading? Where Are you currently? ” to Bob Dylan’s “It’s Across Now, Baby Blue” as well as the article the girl read “about a fantastic in the American Southwest”, she also considered “the legends and folk music connected with the subject of “Death plus the Maiden”‘ when building this history (Latta 1). Oates was well known intended for writing about “the spiritual, sexual, and intellectual decline of modern American society” writing about this sort of issues while suicide, rasurado and murder (eNotes.
com, sect. 2).
Oates was also considering exploring the different aspects of age of puberty through her writing (Schwartz, 1). Critics have widely argued above the influences of “Where Are You Going? Wherever Have You Been? ” and the true identity of Arnold Good friend. Little focus has been given towards the music included into the story and the obvious similarities from the antagonist, Arnold Friend to legendary performer, Bob Dylan. This essay will check out Bob Dylan’s musical influence on “Where Are You Heading?
Where Are you currently? ” by simply interpreting the song, “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue” and the similarities between the two as well as determining physical feature similarities among Dylan and Friend.
Oates dedicated this history to Greg Dylan; which gives interpreters with this story simply cause to assume Dylan’s music during the 1960s tremendously influenced the characters and scenes of “Where Will you be Going? Exactly where Have You Been? ” Critics however do not agree as to whom Arnold Friend represents.
Many critics think that Arnold represents the devil and evil, just like Joyce Wegs’ and Jessica Urbanski who argue that Arnold is wicked and his outlook represents the devil. Some experts however believe that Arnold symbolizes a religious or cultural savior (Jordan). It really is unrealistic to consider that Arnold Friend is definitely any savior such as Robert Tierce and John Eileen Crafton suggest in “Connie’s Tambourine Man: A New Reading of Arnold Friend” (Jordan). It seems most likely that Arnold is a creation of Oates which had the appearance of Frank Dylan since she was inspired by him which will many authorities have already observed.
Another argument made by some of authorities is that Arnold didn’t really exist unfortunately he rather a figment of Connie’s creativity such as McConnell states in “Connie’s Percussion Man: A fresh Reading of Arnold Friend” where he creates, “Connie is the framer, the storyline creator—and the diabolic footprints in her fiction scare her not because they are the manifestations of the outside nasty but since they are the representational extrapolations of her own psyche” (1). There is no reason to think that Connie, a 15 year old lady would envision such a threatening older person.
The moment Connie daydreams, she believes of “the caresses of love” and boys such as the one she met the night before Arnold Good friend showed up in the door. Connie daydreamed about “how good [the boy] had been”, and Connie continues considering how lovely being with this kind of boy had been. She related her experience to be such as the movies and the way it was “promised in songs” (339). Connie was a young young lady living her life in line with the music, and she would not need daydreamed some thing as frightening and terrifying as Arnold Friend.
Whilst critics may disagree about what Arnold represents; there is significant evidence that Arnold is made to look, but not necessarily be, Frank Dylan. Arnold Friend’s physical description is that of Bob Dylan’s appearance in the 1960s. Oates refers to the a radio station DJ, Bobby King, which is in “reference to “Bobby” Dylan, the “king” of rock-and-roll” (McConnell, 1). McConnell also helps the theory that Arnold looks like Bob Dylan, with his “shaggy, shabby black hair that looked crazy as a hairpiece, ” (Oates, 340) his “long and hawk-like nose area, ” (Oates, 342) fantastic unshaven confront.
Arnold also had “big and white” teeth, his lashes, “thick and black as if coated with a black tar-like material” (Oates, 344) and his size, “only a great inch roughly taller” (Oates, 341) than Connie are generally characteristic of Bob Dylan. Arnold “spoke in a fast, bright monotone” voice which in turn “is likewise ‘suggestive of Dylan, especially since this individual speaks’ “in a simple lilting voice, exactly as if this individual were match the words to a song”‘ (Oates, 342) (McConnell, 1).
When Connie became suspicious of his age, just before she realized the danger the lady was in, tiny clues affirmed her emotions that he was indeed a mature man. He used the variety of slang “as if he were working through each of the expressions he’d learned unfortunately he no longer sure which of them was in style”. Arnold used his lyrical tone and bits of lyrics by songs to confuse, enjoyment then terrify Connie. Connie recognized a lot of the lyrics utilized. Michael Kapper accurately portrays the impact of music in Connie’s life. Kapper writes, Rock’n’roll music is known as a constant existence in Connie’s life.
On the drive-in, the backdrop music is definitely “something to depend on” (Oates, 337), and on On the afternoon, without drive-in with out boys around, the music alone gives Connie joy. This omnipresence is definitely even significant in the music’s absence (1). It is important to decipher the similarities between “Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been? ” and Bob Dylan’s “It’s All Over Right now, Baby Blue”. While there are several other tracks that are like the overall theme of Oates’ account, “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue” provides substantial commonalities and support from a number of critics.
The reoccurring lyric in “It’s All Over At this point, Baby Blue” (Dylan) is “…it’s across now”. Arnold Friend consumes the majority of the period at Connie’s house explaining to her that her existence as the girl knows it is over; at the end he says “it’s all over to suit your needs here, and so come out” (349). Connie and her friend were very having faith in and unacquainted with the consequences with their actions. Connie and friend risked traversing the highway to be able to behave like adults, and “…listen for the music that made every thing so good” (337).
Dylan sings in the risks of living around the edge in “It’s around Now, Baby Blue”, caution that “the highway is for gamblers, better use your sense” (7). Connie gambles with her life both equally by crossing a busy highway and by trusting people the girl does not know. Arnold explains to Connie that her amount of time in her residence was more than, telling Connie, “…they don’t know anything about both you and never did and honey you aren’t better than them because not only a one of them might have done this kind of for you” (Oates, 350). Arnold also makes him self look like he is a saint saving Connie by her family who does not really understand her.
This is also present in “It’s Throughout Now, Baby Blue”, where Dylan sings “look out your saints happen to be comin’ through” (5). Dylan sings that “The floor covering, too, is moving below you” (17), this should be what Connie felt once she noticed Arnold was a “forty-year-old baby” (Oates, 344) and when she realized that she would not observe her mother or sleep in her bed again. In the last few passages of Dylan’s song this states; “leave your moving stones behind, something necessitates you. Forget the dead you’ve left, they do not follow you” (19. 20).
Oates’ story echoes Dylan’s song. Connie is departing her residence where this wounderful woman has learned and grown including stepping pebbles and she is going to never discover her family again; if she dead or need to stay with Arnold Friend against her will certainly is personal interpretation. Arnold Friend even so made it clear that she’d not returning. It is noticeable from the useful literary analyses that Joyce Carol Oates’ story “Where Are You Heading? Where Were you? ” is going to continue to have got mixed interpretations of its characters, affect and general theme.
It really is undeniable however , from Oates’ dedication of the story to Bob Dylan and the mind-boggling similarities of “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue” to Oates’ tale that both the story and Oates was heavily affected by Bob Dylan visible in both the antagonist’s features, the choice of terms and the total importance of music to the heroes and theme of the story. Recommendations “It’s Around Now, Baby Blue”. Lyrics. Sony NY BMG Music Entertainment. (2007). 31 Aug 2007 com/? Who-Is-Arnold-Friend? &id=313523>Kapper, Eileen, C. “A Virgin in the Backseat Cigarette smoking Hash: Joyce Carol Oates’s “Where will you be Going, In which Have You Been? ” The Joyce Carol Oates Papers. (1996). 1 Sept 2007 “Oates, Joyce Carol: LAUNCH. ” Brief Story Criticism. Ed. Paul Palmisano Job Editor. Vol. 70. Gale Group, Inc., 2004. eNotes. com. 06. 30 Aug, 2007 1
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