The Relationship between Ponyboy, Johnny, and Dally in S. E. Hinton’s The Outsiders

The Outsiders is about a gang of boys from the wrong side of the tracks who are very misjudged. There is always going to be conflict anywhere someone looks, especially when it is gang related. When someone thinks of gangs, they automatically think of the tough, rough looking guys, but do not judge a book by its cover because it just might be the nice looking, well presented guys that are starting the most trouble. We learn about the relationship that Ponyboy, Johnny, and Dallas have with each other and how close they are with one another while dealing with their life struggles. The socs may be rich, but they are like the enemy, they jump the greasers for fun and like to destroy things. The greasers, on the other hand, are like the heroes, they might be rough, but they are the ones fighting to prove themselves that they are not all bad. They wear their hair slicked back with grease in it and wear leather jackets, and some of them might hold up a gas station every once in a while, but they do not have their parents handing them things left and right because their parents simply do not care where they are or what they are doing. It really shows how some people, like friends, could be more like a family than someone who is actually family.

S. E. Hinton, short for Susan Eloise, was only sixteen when she wrote this novel. The Outsiders is one of the first novels to focus on people from the other side of the tracks. S. E. Hinton had a major impact on young adult fiction (Harris). S. E. Hinton uses her strategy of remaining gender anonymous by only using her initials. She does this because her books are typically first person narrations of male teenagers (Malone). Hinton’s novels typically show how young adults are formed by the env...

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...rature Resources from Gale. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.

Hinton, S. E. The Outsiders. New York: Puffin, 1997. Print.

Malone, Michael. "Tough Puppies." The Nation 242.9 (8 Mar. 1986): 276-278. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Jeffrey W. Hunter and Deborah A. Schmitt. Vol. 111. Detroit: Gale Group, 1999. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.

"On the Hook." The Times Literary Supplement (30 Oct. 1970): 1258. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Jeffrey W. Hunter and Deborah A. Schmitt. Vol. 111. Detroit: Gale Group, 1999. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.

Solomon, Charles. "Review of The Outsiders." The Los Angeles Times Book Review (12 Aug. 1990): 10. Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Jeffrey W. Hunter and Deborah A. Schmitt. Vol. 111. Detroit: Gale Group, 1999. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 27 Jan. 2014.