Title: The Outsiders
Author: S.E. Hinton
Publication: April 24, 1967
Synopsis:
No one ever said life was easy. But Ponyboy is pretty sure that he's got things figured out. He knows that he can count on his brothers, Darry and Sodapop. And he knows that he can count on his friends—true friends who would do anything for him, like Johnny and Two-Bit. But not on much else besides trouble with the Socs, a vicious gang of rich kids whose idea of a good time is beating up on “greasers” like Ponyboy. At least he knows what to expect—until the night someone takes things too far.
First Line:
When I stepped out into the bright sunlight from the darkness of the movie house, I had only two things on my mind: Paul Newman and a ride home.
Favorite Character: Dallas Winston
OTP: Dallas and Cherry ☺️💕✨💖
Favorite Quote: “I could fall in love with Dallas Winston,” she said. “I hope I never see him again, or I will.”
Rating: ★★★★★
My Thoughts:
*SPOILERS*
Life is funny isn’t it? Funny in the way the things we like sometimes change as we age and mature. I think Taylor Swift is the only musician from my early teens that I still love, probably even more now than I did back then, at twenty-eight. I can’t tell you a single book I’d read back then that I would still enjoy today that isn’t for nostalgic reasons.
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton is a book that I was supposed to read at fifteen years old for my advanced English class, but at the time I had so much going on at home that I wasn’t interested in anything and by my last class, which was Science, I was fighting to keep my eyes open. Years later I bought it again to read on my old iPad, but I only got through 1 and a half chapters. I wasn’t paying attention to what I read and I guess I just wasn’t interested in those types of stories at that time. I loved the Twilight Saga and Fallen and etc.
Today, at twenty-eight, I was able to read and finish it thanks to my kindle. I think that’s one of the drawbacks of being a ‘mood reader’ and one of many reasons I love my kindle. Being able to read the books I’m in the mood for the second I’m in the mood for them has helped me become a more voracious reader. Before, I’d always be in the mood to read something else by the time the book I ordered arrived.
I am of the belief that everything happens the way it’s supposed to. Everything happens for a reason. I don’t think that the meaning and the themes of The Outsiders would have resonated with me at fourteen or even twenty-two for that matter the way they have today. There’s something about being in your late twenties and reading a book like The Outsiders and thinking back on your childhood and the people you’ve interacted with or grown up around that makes this book more meaningful. Of course, those who read it back in high school and reread it today as adults might have differing opinions.
S.E. Hinton’s writing is so simple and beautiful and lyrical even which is surprising since she wrote The Outsiders in High School. That is amazing and quite an impressive accomplishment for a teenager to have especially since it’s considered an important piece of literature today. How many 16 or 17 year olds can say that they wrote a book that would be read over and over for years and in some cases even banned for, in my opinion, showing the hard truth of realities? Probably not many.
I love the characters so much. I love Dallas Winston. I can fix him (no really I can). I think Johnny Cade had a better understanding of the insides of people than Ponyboy does. Maybe it’s because Johnny had a more difficult home life than Ponyboy or maybe it’s because Johnny has seen a lot more than he has. I don’t know, but what I do know is that Johnny Cade deserved better than the ending he gets.
I love the foreshadowing S.E. Hinton does throughout the book. I think it’s very impressive she was able to do so on her first book and at such a young age too. I feel like there were times she could’ve gone into a little more detail like the fatal fight between Ponyboy and Johnny and the socs in the park. I feel like there could’ve been more emotion than there already was.
I think S.E. Hinton is incredibly skilled at dialogue. The dialogue and relationships between the characters just flow so beautifully throughout the book. My favorite scene is when Two-Bit, Johnny, and Ponyboy are walking Cherry and Marcia to Two-Bit’s so he could give them a ride home. I love the dialogue between Cherry and Johnny and I love how real it felt and how you could feel the pain Ponyboy feels when he shouts that it’s not fair that the greasers have all the rough breaks and how you could feel the figurative slap Johnny feels when Pony tells him that Johnny’s parents don’t care about him.
I love Ponyboy’s thinking that Darry hates him and I have to wonder if I would have thought that too had I read it when I was younger and if I had thought that how would I see things if I reread it as an adult? I guess I’ll never know. When Darry slaps Pony, as a reader, you can feel the hurt on both ends. As an adult I knew that Darry behaved the way he did and treated Pony the way he does partly because Darry loves him and is afraid to lose him but also because Darry wants Pony to be able to have the opportunities he had but was unable to explore.
I love the scene after everything goes down and the boys look for Dallas and find him at the one guy’s place, I forget his name, and the way Dallas came out to talk to them even though he was tired and sore from having his ribs cracked. I loved the way Dallas smiled when he realized Pony thought he had been with a girl. That way he smiled, I could see him so so clearly, and I think that’s when I started to love him. I love how Dally helped them out and the way he keeps his mouth shut and takes the blame for something Two-Bit did when he could have easily ratted him out. The hair on his chest. The way Dallas opens up to Johnny after Johnny says he and Pony are going to turn themselves in. The way he talks about Cherry and how she hates him and when I read that all I could think to myself was: if only you knew!
God, I fucking love Dallas Winston.
In the beginning of the book Pony only sees people on a surface level. He doesn’t see past their roughness and thinks of them in almost the way socs do. Pony grows up so much throughout the book. I love his relationship with his brothers and how soft all of the guys in their little gang are for each other. You can feel the love between all of them.
To Dallas those guys are the only family he has. They mean the world to him and it shows. I mean, how many people would you go to the door to see with freshly cracked ribs? How many people would you help run from the police to protect them from the hardness that jail can bring you?
Johnny didn’t deserve to die the way he does. Johnny Cade didn’t deserve to die at all. The final moment with Dallas and Johnny in the hospital is heartbreaking. The way Dally hoped that telling Johnny that the greasers beat the socs would make everything better. He thought for sure that if anything could have saved Johnny it would’ve been learning that. Reading it reminded me of Jennette McCurdy talking about how she naively thought that telling her mother she finally reached their goal weight would bring her back. And when telling Johnny that doesn’t work, Dallas tries again and harder this time because now it’s urgent. It was urgent before but now it really is because the thing Dallas thought for sure would save him wasn’t saving him. He tells Johnny that he’s still being called a hero and that he and the boys are proud of him.
Dallas has the biggest heart out of all of them and I think that’s why he prefers to be so hardened or to make people think he was. It was his way of protecting himself from more heartbreak but he’d let his guard down when it came to that lost little puppy that was Johnny Cade who idolized him and admired him so much. He didn’t even see it coming. I think the line that sums up Dally is one he speaks himself: “… you get tough like me and you don’t get hurt. You look out for yourself and nothin’ can touch you.”
I want to say that Dallas didn’t deserve to die the way he does, because he didn’t, but it’s hard because it was his choice. He wanted to die. He lost the one person he let himself love and I have to believe that it was also guilt that led him to dying the way he did. Guilt for being the one who told the boys about the church and how to get there.
God, I fucking love Dallas Winston.
