Ponyboy Curtis

Ponyboy Curtis is one of many "Greasers", he is shy, quiet, and only 14 years of age, he gets good grades and likes to draw and read although, he is a criminal at mind and heart. He lost his parents in a car crash and now lives with his two older brothers. S.E. Hinton displays an adventurous and interesting plotline for the book “The Outsiders”. The well written novel shows Ponyboy as a very meek and healthy boy but somewhat of a pacifist; to me he is shown as the total opposite.

The beginning really stood out to me because Ponyboy is leaving a movie theater where he is jumped by a group of Socs. He is saved from the attack by some Greasers which include his two brother’s Darry and Sodapop. That night, Dallas, Johnny, and Ponyboy meet two Soc girls, Cherry and Marcia. Ponyboy realizes that Cherry is nothing like the Socs he has met before. She tells Ponyboy that "things are rough all over", indicating that the rich kids have problems of their own.  In these few pages of the book Hinton exposes two different sides of Ponyboy.  That he is level headed and sweet but can be a bad kid that doesn’t want to listen.

            Ponyboy; the members of the greasers would probably call him the “tiny tot” of the group. He gets along best with Johnny Cade. They both don’t really have a parent to look up to and they are both upon the more meek side of the gang. Their relationship is almost like a flower and a stem, the flower can’t stand up without its stem and Ponyboy can’t really get a hold of reality without Johnny.

            I think that throughout this book Hinton shows that you should stand up for people if you are truly their friend. The reason this book really stood out to me was because the greasers show what true friendship is like and they show that even though someone may look like a rough and tough person they might have a true kindness in their heart somewhere.