A Rose for Emily vs Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been: Compare & Contrast

In the current speedy advancing world, being enlightened about the different types of emotional behaviors is a subject of great concern. One of the common emotional behaviors is losing control. In simple terms, losing control refers to the lack of ability in an individual to provide a conscious set of limitations of impulses and behavior resulting from overwhelming emotions. It includes various states of agitation such as uncontrollable use of harsh words, uncontrollable weeping, becoming angry, extreme anxiety, and involuntary immobility caused by extreme fear. In this regard, this paper focuses on a thorough analysis of the subject losing control via an account of two stories, which are “Where are you going, where have you been” and “A Rose for Emily.”

It is vital to note that losing control is an emotional characteristic that is well explained outlined in several sections of the story of where are you going, where have you been. In this story, losing control is first seen in Connie’s mother.

Connie’s mother loses control particularly in stopping her daughter from keeping on looking at herself through the mirror. Connie is so cute and keeps on looking at herself through the mirror. Instead of practicing a calm approach towards changing the character of her daughter, Connie’s mother completely loses control in addressing this issue. She goes ahead to shouting at her daughter to stop gawking at herself and even asking her if she thinks she is so pretty (Oates, 1966).

In essence, the character of Connie’s mother losing control is so extreme that she keeps on praising Connie’s sister, June. All the praises go to June and they include June the point that is the best in cleanliness, saving money, and cooking. On the other hand, Connie is being blamed for having bad friends and wasting time in the mirror. As a result, Connie loses control and begins thinking that her mother should die and herself too (Oates, 1966).  

 Another crucial incident of losing control is where a boy by the name Arnold Friend visits Connie’s home and offers to take her for a ride. The boy is highly excited and impressed by the beauty in Connie to the extent that he loses control of the approach he applies to persuade her. A friend is so excited that he keeps on saying that Connie is already a lover of his. All this is driven by the loss of control he has particularly as he imagines being in love with Connie. At some point, the boy explains how he will make love to Connie. He outlines that, “I hold you so tight you won’t think you have to try to get away or pretend anything because you’ll know you can’t. And I’ll come inside you where it’s all secret and you’ll give in to me and you’ll love me.” All this is driven by the loss of control in Arnold Friend particularly on his emotions of love (Oates, 1966).

Lastly but certainly not the least, losing control in this story is seen in Connie’s extreme act of fear. Connie runs to call the police to come and arrest Arnold Friend. As she picks the telephone, she hears a roaring sound in her ears. Immediately, her arms begin to freeze, the telephone becomes clammy and heavy to carry. Even her fingers become weak and she starts screaming. In essence, there is nothing serious to make her so sick with fear. Instead, all this is because of the losing control of her sense of fear (Oates, 1966).

 In the story, A Rose for Emily, there is a significant set of acts of losing control. The top incident is where city authorities come for taxes at Emily’s home. As a conscious person, Miss Emily should have provided the authorities with clear documentation and careful explanation as to why she cannot pay the taxes. Instead, Miss Emily is so rude to them arguing that she just cannot the taxes because she has no taxes and cannot explain why. This is due to the fact she has become angry about being requested to pay tax. Miss Emily goes ahead to vanquishing the authorities (Faulkner, 2015).

The same story has a very clear incident of loss of control. This is where a Judge tells a woman to her face and in front of other people that she smells bad. The Judge, as a man of a professional and high caliber, could have found a better way of asking the woman to practice cleanliness. This can be by telling another respected woman to call the smelling woman privately and request her to practice cleanliness. However, due to loss of control, the Judge addresses the issue in a manner that is unpleasant (Faulkner, 2015).

 Lastly but gain, not the least, an incident of loss of control is seen in the incident were Miss Emily wants to buy poison. To be precise, Miss Emily is hereby telling the druggist, “I want some poison.” Her main aim is to use the poison in killing the man, kidnap him, and sleep with him. Clearly, at this moment, Miss Emily has completely lost control of her normal womanhood feelings (Faulkner, 2015).   

 It is vital to note that the emotional behavior of loss of control is one of the common incidents experienced in our day-to-day ways of life. As seen in the aforementioned two stories, there is a significant number of incidents of loss control experienced by the actors. These incidents include the use of very harsh words by Connie’s mother, freezing of Connie’s hands because of fear and request for poison by Miss Emily to use it in poisoning a man, kidnap him, and sleep with him. Thus, it is important to outline that in order to live a happy and successful life, it is important people practice efficient ways of controlling emotions.

References:

Faulkner, W. (2015).A Rose for Emily. Retrieved from http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~rebeccal/lit/238f11/pdfs/Emily_Faulkner.pdf

Oates, J. (1966). “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been”. Retrieved from https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CB4QFjAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.d.umn.edu%2F~csigler%2FPDF%2520files%2Foates_going.pdf&ei=EuiLVZr9JrCR7Aaz2YbgDQ&usg=AFQjCNGibB75dnGsSz4ASfid8RkqvovY5g&sig2=C6IW0D_2bQthsDWYRebIvA&bvm=bv.96782255,d.ZGU