The Outsiders

The Outsiders In this book analysis, about the book “The Outsiders” by S. E. Hinton I will discuss character and plot development, as well as the setting, the author’s style and my opinions about the book. In this part of the analysis I will give some information about the subjects of the book, and about the author. The author wrote the story when she was just 16 years old, in the 1950s. The book was successful, and it was sold, and still being sold, in many copies as a young adults novel. There was a movie made about it, and today there are still many schools that use this book in junior high and high schools for English classes. There were plays made about the book too. The Outsiders is about a gang. They live in a city in Oklahoma. Ponyboy Curtis, a 14 year old greaser, tells the story. Other characters include Sodapop and Darry, Ponyboy's brothers, Johnny, Dallas, and Two- Bit, that were also gang members and Ponyboy's friends. This story deals with two forms of social classes: the socs, the rich kids, and the greasers, the poor kids. The socs go around looking for trouble and greasers to beat up, and then the greasers are blamed for it, because they are poor and cannot affect the authorities. I hope you would enjoy and learn something about the book from reading this analysis. Plot Development The plot development in the book, “The Outsiders” by S.E. Hinton, was easy to follow. In this part of the book analysis I will give some more details about the plot development. There were no hooks or hurdles in the beginning of the book, the first sentence starts right away with the plotвЂ"without any forewords. This is the beginning of the first sentence: “When I stepped out into the bright sunlight from the darkness of the movie house...” (page 9). As you can see, it goes straight to the point without any prologues or any kind of introduction. The plot development in the middle of the story was sensible and easy to understand. It was clear and simple, and the events have occurred in a reasonable order. The ending of the story was a bit expected. I anticipated the death of Johnny because a broken neck usually means death. The death of Dally was not as predictable as Johnny’s death because it was said that: “He was tougher than the rest of usвЂ"tougher, colder, meaner.” (page 19). I did not think that such a tough person would get himself killed because of a death of a friend, although it was said a short time before the death of Dally that: “Johnny was the only thing Dally loved.” (page 160). The climaxes at the end of the story were the deaths of Johnny and Dally. Here are quotations about the deaths: Johnny’s death: “The pillow seemed to sink a little, and Johnny died.” (page 157). Dally’s death: “He was jerked half around by the impact of the bullets, then slowly crumpled with a look of grim triumph on his face. He was dead before he hit the ground.” (page 162). To conclude I can say that the plot development was simple and easy to understand and to follow. The author organized it in a way that fits the actual content of the plot. Character Development The characters in the book, “The Outsiders” by S.E. Hinton, were not very heroicвЂ"they were just humansвЂ"it was easy to believe that this is the way they should be. The characters in the plot give the reader a feeling this can be a true story. The author has created the personality of the characters through the descriptions of PonyboyвЂ"the narratorвЂ"and through their actions. Following are some examples of these methods of getting familiar with a character. Here is an example for a description of Ponyboy: “Steve Randle was seventeen, tall and lean, with thick greasy hair he kept combed in complicated swirls. He was cocky, smart, and Soda’s best buddy since grade school. Steve’s specialty was cars...” (page 17). The reader can find this kind of descriptions almost everywhere in the story, but especially in the beginning. I think the author put them there because the reader does not know the characters, and he needs to get familiar with them. The descriptions make the reader know the characters better and understand their actions. A good example of an action that was taken and suggested something about a character is the way Dally was killed. He wanted the police to kill him, so he robbed a store, and the police officers shoot him. This shows that Dally was sensitive to a death of a friend although he acted like a tough guy. The dialogues in the stories show the thoughts and the feelings of the speakers. The way the gang members talk shows that they are gang members and street boys, because they speak in street slang. When the socs talk to greasers, the reader can feel their aversion to them. Following are some examples for dialogues that indicate something about the characters. Here is an example for a dialogue with slang in it: “...so I can still help Darry with the bills and stuff...Tuff enough. Wait till I get out...I told you he don’t mean half of what he says...” (page 26). The highlighted words and phrases are ones that will not be used in formal writing and they even contain grammar mistakes. Here is an example for the hate the socs have to the greasers: “вЂ?Hey, grease,’ one said in an over-friendly voice. вЂ?We’re gonna do you a favor, greaser. We’re gonna cut all that long greasy hair off.вЂ™Ð²Ð‚Ñœ (page 13). The reader can feel the hatred of the socs to the greaser in this dialogue when they tell him what they are going to do to him. The central figure of the story is Ponyboy that is also the narrator. Here I would analyze his character. The physical description of Ponyboy can be found in the first page of the book, page 9: “I have light-brown, almost-red hair and greenish-gray eyes. I wish they were more gray, because I hate most guys that have green eyes, but I have to be content with what I have. My hair is longer than a lot of boys wear theirs, squared off in back and long at the front and sides, but I am a greaser and most of my neighborhood rarely bothers to get a haircut. Besides, I look better with long hair.” He is smart, according to page 12: “...I make good grades and have a high IQ and everything...”. He is a bit naive sometimes, like in page 45 when he tried to convince himself that the only difference between socs and greasers is that greasers like Elvis and do not like the Beatles and socs like the Beatles and do not like Elvis. Sometimes, Ponyboy is daydreaming and not connected