The Outsider Experience

I really liked the book The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton because it is one of those few books that gives you a new and different perspective on how we first perceived things to be. Every character from this story has a different experience but they all stick up for each other at the end, no matter what the cost is. What really made this book interesting was when Johnny Cade murdered Bob, a member of the Socs. After this incident occurred, everything appeared to be more fast paced and things started to get more exciting and deeper. For example, Johnny and Ponyboy had to run away from the law, they saved children from burning church building, and a rumble occurred. What makes it more touching is how this book reflects our reality in our society.

Also, the emotions portrayed in this book are not made up, but are emotions conveyed by and from the author of this story, S.E. Hinton. On a side note, There were multiple, major themes of this book like don't judge a person before you take the time to know them and to never quit. The first theme stated above is very prominent throughout this book because Ponyboy (at first) uses his perception to judge certain members of the Greasers and the Socs when later in the book, his claims contradict the reality. This could be shown in the following, I'm not sure how you spell it, but [Socs] is the abbreviation for Socials, the West-side rich kids. It's like the term greaser that's used to class all us boys on the East Side (Hinton 4). This passage from the book allows us to see that Ponyboy perceives that money seems to be the main thing that divides Greasers and Socs. He sees his society and his world as divided by those have and those who just don't have. Also, when Johnny at the end told Ponyboy to stay golden (Hinton 126) he meant to never quit on whatever he loves to do. It does not matter what social and economic class you are labeled to be from, you just have to fight and keep on pursuing your dream. And whatever traumatic tragedy happens, don't let that stop you from having a purpose in life. I would recommend this book to anybody who loves a good though thought provoking book. Whatever genre you like this is a kind of book that shows reality at its finest, but in a different way. In addition, the Outsiders is deeper and it has a variety of different emotions displayed throughout the book than any other book I have read. The suspense is even different. The suspense is almost a matter of life or death.

I think the interesting aspect of the text was both the character development, like how Ponyboy was a dynamic character, and the Conflict. We can obviously see that Ponyboy changed because of the traumatic experience faced after his parents death, Johnny's death, and also Dally's death. The Conflict was also an interesting aspect of the text because of the disagreements with the two social classes, the Greasers and the Socs. Because of the clashes between these two groups, the tension and suspense started to boil to a point where the characters made the Conflict more interesting. The Socs are richer than the Greasers and don't trust or care about each other. When they do have to speak to each other, the reactions are almost all the time emotionally bad, like when Bob and Randy attacked Ponyboy and Johnny because they were to friendly with their girls (Cherry and Marcia). But sometimes, they react emotionally good, like when Cherry talks with Ponyboy at the movie theatre with Johnny.

When you read this book, you will probably realize that it talks about the obstacles faced of being an outsider and outcast. And that everyone is an outsider in some way, it is just a matter of perception. If I could relate this book to my personal life, it would be the fact of how I see people being bullied because of their social status or the way they dress. I feel as if this is something that needs to changed and stopped as soon as possible, because it harming people. I would also recommend this book to people who live in an upper-class environment, because then they would reflect on different people in different types of environments. It would show them how the less fortunate live and maybe, just maybe, they would change their attitude on the poor (if they had a bad one to begin with).

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