The Symbolism Of Numbers In Short Stories

Interpretation and perception of things can vary differently from person to person. Everything is not only black and white, but extremely colorful in the way people view things differently. I would not think that Oates story was based upon a real event or that numbers can be in a graph that can make words form the bible, connecting them. I know that the bible has numbers in it, but I do not think that you can take a random number and connect it straight to a chapter and verse in the bible. I believe that short stories can be fiction or nonfiction, but not both, and I believe that numbers represent plain numbers. Most people think of numbers as numbers, but to others, they can have multiple meanings. The three numbers on the side of Arnolds
The number sixty-nine has been deemed as a sexual number, which correlates with Arnolds sexual demeanor towards Connie (Hurley 63). At the end of the story, it is to be suspected that Arnold takes Connie and rapes her, so I can see how Hurley believes that the numbers added up can be correlated to that ending (Oates 5). Another conclusion that can be made is that the numbers are derived from chapters of Judges and Genesis from the old testament of the bible. This is quite surprising to me because I would not have thought that anything from the story could be traced back to the bible. Judges is the thirty third book from the end of the old testament. Judges 19:17 reads, “When he raised his eyes he got to see the man, the traveler, in the public square of the city. So the old man said: ‘Where are you going, and where do you come from?’”. From that, you can see how some would perceive
When I first read the story, I did not know what to think of him. Ellis makes a broad connection that Ellie could be Eddie, the guy that Connie met with at the dinner for three hours (Oates 1, Ellis 56). He notes that the two names are similar in their spelling. He believes that the name Eddie comes from how he “eddies” while sitting in his chair due to “bottled up sexual pressure” (Ellis 56). I do not think that is how Oates got the name, but I do believe that Ellie was nervous and him being a boy, probably did have sexual intentions towards Connie. Oates never made it clear that Connie saw Eddie because it was dark and she did not really care to see his face (Oates 1-2). With Arnold knowing so much about Connie’s friends and family, he could have been told all of that from Eddie because of how long they that they were together. With that, I understand how the two people, Ellie and Eddie, could be the same person. When Ellie was in Arnold’s car, Oates never says that Connie gets a good look at him, and he does not speak. Therefore, Connie would not have been able to recognize him as Eddie