Essay On The Outsiders

Bianca Greenan
Ms. Copeland
ELA D Block
30 March 2023
TITLE
S. E. Hinton’s 1967 fiction novel, The Outsiders, is about the life of a 14-year-old boy named Ponyboy Curtis. In The Outsiders, two different “groups” separate all the characters: the Socs and the Greasers. The Socs and Greasers don’t like each other because both groups are stereotyped and do not understand each other. The Socs are a group of wealthy teenagers living on the West side of town. They are the popular kids who drive “tuff” cars and wear nice clothes. They are enemies of the Greasers. The Greasers are poor kids that live on the East side of town. They are called Greasers because of their greasy, slicked-back long hair. Because the Greasers are poor and vulnerable, they

Johnny Cade is a skittish 16-year-old boy Greaser. He is best friends with the main character, Ponyboy. Johnny has lived a harsh, scary life alone, aside from his family-like Greaser friends. At home, Johnny doesn’t have a loving family. Both of his parents abuse him. He doesn’t like sleeping at home, so he often sleeps in any of the other Greasers' houses or outside. “His father was always beating him up, and his mother ignored him, except when she was hacked off at something, and then you could hear her yelling at him clear down at our house.” (Hinton, 12) The author shows that Johnny has a tough life by giving examples like this when introducing Johnny and throughout the book. This quote shows that Johnny has a tough life because he doesn’t have a safe, loving family. Before the story began, Johnny had gotten beaten and traumatized badly by the Socs. Johnny is used to being abused by his father, “But those beatings had been nothing like this. Johnny's face was cut up and bruised and swollen, and there was a wide gash from his temple to his cheekbone”(10). Johnny had gotten beaten and scared badly by the Socs, and since that day, he has become super jumpy and skittish. “Johnny never walked by himself after that. And Johnny, who was the most law-abiding of us, now carried in his back pocket a six-inch switchblade.”

Cherry is a Soc and popular cheerleader who goes to Ponyboy’s school. She is an important part of the story because she teaches Ponyboy something that changes how he views the world. “Things are rough all over,” Cherry says to Ponyboy on page 35. Cherry and Ponyboy were talking together about why Johnny is like the way he is being so jumpy and Ponyboy told Cherry the story about what happened. After the story, Cherry says "All Socs aren't like that"(34). She explains that not all Socs are how they might seem to be to Greasers. When she says this, she means that life is hard for even herself, though you might not assume it to be that way because of how Socs are stereotyped. Life is rough all over, so no matter who you are, life is rough. On page 34, Cherry says, “I'll bet you think the Socs have it made. The rich kids, the West-side Socs. I'll tell you something, Ponyboy, and it may come as a surprise. We have troubles you've never even heard of.” Cherry says, as a Soc herself, that most people think that all Socs have such an easy, perfect life. In reality, they have problems you might never have even thought of. Socs have so much time and money that they don’t know what to do with it all. The Socs are always looking for something to fulfill them and make them feel something, but they already have too much that they don’t get that feeling. That is the reason why