O'Connor's Mrs. May and Oates's Connie: an unlikely pair of religious initiates - Flannery O'Connor, Joyce Carol Oates

Studies in Short Fiction, Summer, 1994 by Nancy Bishop Dessommes

The most intriguing similarity between the stories is the authors, use of the nightmarish, sexually alarming, male intruder who appears unexpectedly to disturb the comfortable universe the female character has built. Both females are threatened by the grotesque embodiment of spiritual reality and are conquered by that force in a cataclysmic vision at the end of the story.

Interestingly, both intruders are anticipated, if not experienced, in a dream. Although the question of whether Arnold Friend is a vision, a "daymare," or a literal abductor has been thoroughly argued, a close reading does reveal that Connie's experience has all the earmarks of a nightmare, one that has been triggered by the shaggy-haired boy in the gold car whom she had seen at the drive-in.(1) Critics who have argued that Arnold Friend is real (and those who have argued the dream theory) have overlooked one detail from the drive-in scene: the car itself, "a convertible jalopy painted gold" (37). Oates makes no mention of the dented bumper, strange slogans, or cartoonish pictures that Connie notices right away when the car is parked in her driveway. The reader would think that such an unusual sight at the local teen hangout would be sure to draw a comment, if not a crowd. But only Connie - not even the group she is walking with - notices the boy who speaks only to her. "Gonna get you, baby" (37). During Connie's imaginary encounter with Friend, the details about the car - especially the sexist comment "DONE BY CRAZY WOMAN DRIVER" written around the smashed fender - take on psychological significance, as does the character of Friend himself.