I remember borrowing this book for English class in Grade 8. The cover, in black and white, showed a boy in an unbuttoned shirt smoking a cigarette. Of course, then and there I immediately formed a distasteful opinion about the book. Little did I know, The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton would prove me wrong in just about everything I’d believed about it.
“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.” Such a clever opening line, and you’ll see why once you finish the book. Ponyboy Curtis is a fourteen-year-old greaser, living with his two older brothers in the East Side of Tulsa, Oklahoma, where 1960s slang, cigarettes, and switchblades are rife. The novel opens with a “rumble,” one of the slang words meaning “fight.” It’s a jarring way to start a book, especially when the main character is nearly killed, but it’s an honest representation of the rough life in the East Side.
Despite the discrepancy between Ponyboy and I, the moment he said he liked to “lone it anyway” and that watching a movie with someone was “kind of uncomfortable, like having someone read your book over your shoulder,” I’d already formed a connection with Ponyboy, just like that. I also learned, as I began to delve into the story with increasing eagerness, that he liked Gone with the Wind, Pepsi, and watching sunsets.
As more characters, each one used to life in the streets, yet so unique and endearing, entered the scene, I had the incredible joy of being drawn into a story with a setting so different from my own. Among the anger, running away, and burning churches were also horse stories, poems, and the best hair jokes. By the time I’d finished—and written an essay, a report, an analysis, and a poem about it—I knew that this would be a book I’d keep close to me through the years.
And I’ve been treating myself to it every year since. I find myself turning to this short novel to taste the raw teenage narrative of the brokenness of the world: drunk parents, alcohol addiction, guns, and the police. These issues seem sadly and completely ubiquitous today as much as they were back then. Yet among those things are also a few of the most beautiful friendships I’ve ever come across in literature. If you’ve never read The Outsiders, I think you’re missing out on some greatness; this book is a literary treasure.
