Module 2: The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton

Bibliographic Citation: Hinton, S. E. The Outsisders. New York: Speak, 1967.

  

Plot Summary:

Ponyboy is an orphan who lives with his two older brothers, Soda and Darry.  Even though Ponyboy doesn't have a normal family, he does have a great group of friends.  The gang, or the greasers are Ponyboy's family.  The greasers live in the east side, and their enemies, the socs, live in the west side.  One night, Ponyboy and his best friends Johnny, are apprehended by a couple of socs, they get into a fight and Johnny ends up stabbing one of the socs, Bob.  The boys must decide what to do, so they turn to the toughest greaser they know, Dally.  Dally gives them money, a gun, and a plan.

Ponyboy and Johnny run away to Windrixville to hide out in an abandoned church, where they hide out for a week.  Eventually Dally visits them, takes them out to eat, and brings news from home, the socs and the greasers have planned a big rumble to settle their differences.  When the boys go back to the abandoned church, they find the church in flames, and Ponyboy and Johnny realize there are children in the church.  The two boys quickly take matters into their own hands and rescue the children from the burning church.  In the process, Johnny gets badly hurt, he ends up with 3 degree burns and a broken back.  

The boys are taken to the hospital, where Johnny is in critical condition.  The rumble still goes on and the boys fight.  The greasers end up winning the fight, but its useless.  When Ponyboy and Johnny visit Dally in the hospital, after the rumble, they realize Johnny is about to die.  Minutes later, Johnny dies and this is Dally's breaking point.  Dally runs out and gets himself in trouble, but before being arrested he takes out a gun and police officers kill him.  Ponyboy looses to friends in the same night.   

My Impressions of the Book:

I absolutely love this book!  As soon as you start reading this book, you can't help but fall in love with the characters and can't help but shed a tear when Johnny and Dally die.  This is one of those books where at least one of the characters reminds you of someone you know.  The social issues the greasers face on a dailybasis are social issues teens face today; I think this is why this book seems so real and it is still popular today, 40+ years after it was written.  This book was definitely a quick read, and I could not put the book down because I wanted to know what was going to happen next.   

Review(s) About the Book:

New York Times

‘The Outsiders’: 40 Years Later

By DALE PECK

Published: September 23, 2007

Few books come steeped in an aura as rich as S. E. Hinton’s novel “The Outsiders,” which celebrates its 40th anniversary this year. At a time when the average young-adult novel was, in Hinton’s characterization, “Mary Jane went to the prom,” “The Outsiders” shocked readers with its frank depictions of adolescents smoking, drinking and “rumbling.” Although other pop culture offerings had dealt with these themes — most notably “Rebel Without a Cause” and “West Side Story” — their intended audience was adult. By contrast, “The Outsiders” was a story “for teenagers, about teenagers, written by a teenager.” Hinton’s candid, canny appraisal of the conflict between Socs, or Socials, and Greasers (for which one might substitute Jets and Sharks), published when she was 17, was an immediate hit and remains the best-selling young-adult novel of all time.
For the complete essay review:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/23/books/review/Peck-t.html

Barnes & Nobles Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

The Outsiders is a book that delves deeply into the hearts, minds, and stories of a group that had no voice before S. E. Hinton gave them one. She began writing the book at age 15, spurred on by the disturbing trend she saw growing in her high school towards division between groups. "I was worried and angered by the social situation," Hinton writes. "I saw two groups at the extreme ends of the social scale behaving in an idiotic fashion -- one group was being condemned and one wasn't.... When a friend of mine was beaten up for no other reason than that some people didn't like the way he combed his hair, I took my anger out by writing about it."

Thirty years after it was first published, The Outsiders still carries the same frightening and unifying messages for teens (and readers of all ages). The ruthlessly realistic and violent story of the Greasers and the Socs, rival gangs from very different sides of the railroad tracks, is narrated by Ponyboy Curtis, a smart, sensitive kid who has grown to become one of the most recognizable figures in the history of young adult literature. Any teen who has ever felt isolated or different can identify with Ponyboy, a kid forced to be tough on the outside, but who underneath is just as scared and needy as anyone. Hinton herself has said that she has never written a character as close to her own self as Ponyboy is. Young Adult fiction was shaped and defined by Susan Eloise Hinton, and the realism she attached to the genre became the norm, enabling later writers like Robert Cormier and Judy Blume to find characters and voices that actually spoke to adolescents. Since 1967, Ponyboy has become the hero for countless teenagers nationwide as The Outsiders stands to influence an entire new legion of adolescents who need Ponyboy as much as ever.

Use in Library Setting:

I would use this book in a book club, with teens of course.  I would also display this book as part of a classics display, books that every teen should read at least once.