Essay on Literary Devices in 'The Outsiders'

Main Characters:

Ponyboy Curtis: The novel's narrator who is fourteen years old and a greaser. He has 'light-brown, almost-red hair, and greenish-gray eyes,' and wears his hair 'longer than a lot of boys wear theirs, squared off in the back and long at the front and sides.'

Darry Curtis: A muscular, tall man who has broad shoulders and dark brown that sticks out in the front of his head with a cowlick in the back. His eyes 'are like two pieces of pale blue-green ice.'. He serves as a parent figure and friend to his two younger brothers as well as his friend group.

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Sodapop Curtis: A happy-go-lucky person who is the middle child in the Curtis family. He is described as handsome and charming. He plans to marry Sandy, a greaser girl and often serves as the family's mediator.

Dally Winston (Dallas): The toughest in Ponyboy’s group of greasers and used to run with gangs in New York. He has a small, delicate face, icy blue eyes, and white-blond hair. Dally feels protective of Johnny Cade and is the most violent out of the Greasers.

Johnny Cade: Sixteen-year-old greaser with black hair and large, fearful eyes. is nervous and sensitive and sees the greasers as his true family. In turn, the older boys, particularly Dally, are protective of him. He is unselfish and loving, he risked his life for many people

Minor characters:

Mr. Syme: Ponyboy's English teacher. He gives Ponyboy a second chance when his grades are slipping. An essay he assigns to Ponyboy and his gang turns into the novel itself.

Jerry Wood: A teacher who accompanies Ponyboy to the hospital after Ponyboy saves the children from the fire. He judges the greasers on their merits instead of automatically branding them juvenile delinquents.

Favorite Character: My favorite character is Johnny Cade because I like his soft, sensitive nature. He has such a good heart, his innocent character made me feel connected to him and what happened to him in the novel broke my heart.

Setting:

The story is set in an unnamed city most likely Tulsa, in Oklahoma in the 1960s. There are many settings throughout the novel, as they go from place to place. They are located in a small town, at the beginning of the novel, they are at a drive-in movie theater. Other settings include a home, hospital, school, park, and courtroom.

Exposition:

In the 1960s, in Tulsa, Oklahoma we are introduced to a boy with long, light-brown, almost-red hair, and greenish-gray eyes named Ponyboy Curtis. He is a member of a lower-class group from the Eastside known as the Greasers. Walking home alone from the movies, Ponyboy is mobbed and jumped by a huge gang of Socs, the greasers' wealthy upper-class rivals from the West Side of town. They threaten him with a knife to his throat when his two brothers Darry and Sodapop come to rescue him, little after, his whole gang then comes, chasing all the socs away. Ponyboy states that walking alone is unsafe for greasers because it attracts the socs. His gang includes Johnny Cade, an innocent, sensitive sixteen-year-old; Dally, the toughest in the group with a long criminal record; Steve, a cocky and intelligent person; and Two-Bit, the oldest and funniest group member. The next day Ponyboy, Jonny, and Dally Sneak into a drive-in movie theater where they meet two girls from the socs named Cherry and Marica. As the movie plays, Dally harassingly flirts with the girls making nasty comments. Johnny tells him to stop and after a bit, he walks away. Ponyboy and Johnny start talking with the girls, and Ponyboy and Cherry realize they have a lot in common. After the movie, Two-Bit comes and they head to Two-Bit's house so that he can drive them home.

Rising Action:

On the walk to his house, they bump into Cherry and Marica's drunk boyfriends, they get into a little argument and the two girls end up going with their boyfriends to prevent any further fighting. As a result, Ponyboy arrives home late where he finds Darry, his older brother is furious with him and they begin to fight. Ponyboy storms out of the house, sick of his brother's constant torment, on the way he finds Jonny and they both head to the park it's 2:30 in the morning. At the park, They see a blue Mustang pull up and Bob and Randy show up with their gang. They attack the two and start drowning Ponyboy in the cold park fountain. As he's splashing and fighting to breathe, he passes out and wakes up on the ground next to Johnny holding a bloody switchblade and Bob's dead body. Johnny had killed Bob in fear that they would have drowned Ponyboy and kill him next. They start running to Dally, someone they can trust to help them. They get to Dally and he gives them a gun and some money then takes a train to Windrixville and finds an abandoned church to stay at. They had a long day so as soon as they arrived, they collapsed to sleep. The next day Johnny goes out to buy supplies and comes back with food and other supplies. For a week they hid out there, they cut and dyed their hair so they could change their appearances to disguise themselves. After several days, Dally goes to check up on them and they are happy to see each other again. He takes Johnny and Ponyboy to the Dairy Queen and mentions that since the murder of Bob, tensions between the greasers and the socs have escalated and there is said to be a fight the next night to settle this matter. He says that Cherry is working as a spy for the greasers. Johnny tells Dally that he is feeling guilty and wants to turn himself in and Dally tries to convince him otherwise, he doesn't want to see Johnny be corrupted in prison. Dally drives the two boys home and on the way, they see the church where they had been hiding on fire. Ponyboy and Johnny jump out of the car and run toward it seeing a group of schoolchildren inside. The boys rush into the flames saving all the children they can. As they lift the last child out the window, the roof starts caving in. Johnny pushes Ponyboy out the window, saving him and getting crushed by the roof. Ponyboy blacks out and awake in the ambulance accompanied by one of the teachers, Jerry Wood from the incident. Jerry tells Ponyboy that Dally got scorched, but he will be fine. But Johnny, on the other hand, is in critical condition, and he may have fractured his back. The man praises them, asking if he and Johnny are professional heroes. Ponyboy informs him that they are just greasers. Ponyboy himself is fine and has just suffered mild burns. He confides in the teacher and tells him about Bob’s death and Jerry agrees that Johnny killed Bob in self-defense and that he is not in the wrong. Jerry stays with him at the hospital. Darry and Sodapop arrive to pick up Ponyboy. Darry cries embracing his brother, making Ponyboy realize that Darry does care about him, at this moment he feels everything will be fine. In the hospital waiting room, the police interview Ponyboy, Sodapop, and Darry. The Doctors come out and say that Dally will be fine, but Johnny's back was broken and even if he survives, he will be crippled permanently. The following morning, they read in the newspaper announcing what Ponyboy, Dally, and Johnny did calling them heroes. According to the papers, the state plans to prosecute Johnny with manslaughter and send both Ponyboy and Johnny to juvenile court, where Ponyboy might be sent to a boys' home. When going home, Cherry is seen by Ponyboy and Two-Bit, she claims the socs have decided to fight without using weapons.

Climax:

Ponyboy feels sick before the big fight, his instincts are telling him to skip the fight, but he instead takes five aspirins, the rest of the greaser boys get ready, making themselves look tuff before they leave for the rumble and leave. There were twenty-two socs and twenty greasers ready to fight. Darry steps up and one of the socs challenges him, they circle each other and Dally joins in, initiating the fight to break out fully. After a long, hard fight, the greasers come out victorious. But the fight leaves the greasers depressed, winning the fight didn’t excite them as they thought it would. When the fight ends Ponyboy and Dally visit Johnny in the hospital, on the way a police officer stops them so Ponyboy fakes an injury to get out of this situation. The officer gets them to the hospital and there the two boys find Johnny dying. Johnny tells them He doesn’t want to fight anymore and that fighting is useless, he tells Ponyboy to “stay gold.” and then passes away with Dally and Ponyboy beside him. Dally feels overwhelmed with emotions and runs out of the room. Ponyboy feels depressed and wanders out alone, with his head bleeding from the rumble. He goes home and tells the greasers that Johnny is dead. Johnnys' death caused Dally to break down and rob a grocery store. He calls the greasers telling them what he did and that he is running from the police. The greasers run out to find Dally and see him get shot by the cops after he pulls out the unloaded gun he always carries.

Falling Action:

Shortly after Ponyboy passes out from exhaustion and dizziness, he speculates Dally wanted to die and did that on purpose. Ponyboy wakes up after three days of being delirious and learns from Darry that he got a concussion when he was kicked in the head. After he recovers from his concussion, Ponyboy is restricted to bed rest for a week, throughout this time he did a lot of reading and drawing. While on bed rest, he went through one of Soda's yearbooks and found a picture that seemed familiar. It was Bob, he wondered about him and what he was like. He is interrupted by Darry saying there is someone to see him. He is visited by Randy who behaves insensitively not at all considering what Ponyboy has been through. Randy expresses concern about being linked to the violence and mentions the hearing that will take place the next day. Ponyboy is bewildered and tells Randy that he killed Bob and that Johnny is still alive. After hearing this commotion, Darry asks Randy to leave. Darry told Randy to never say anything about Johnny to Ponyboy because he’s still pretty racked up mentally and emotionally.

Resolution:

The next day at the hearing, Ponyboy doesn’t have to speak that much because his doctor had a long talk with the judge about Ponyboy's current state. The socs all told the same story and told mainly the truth, they said Johnny had killed Bob. Cherry testified what had happened before and after Johnny and Ponyboy had been jumped. When the judge finally got around to questioning Ponyboy, he asked if he liked living with Darry, if he liked school, what kind of grades he got, and things like that. He did this because he saw him looking anxious, so he could calm him down. After that, he said Ponyboy was acquitted, and just like that the whole case was closed. The judge acquitted Ponyboy of all wrongdoing and allowed him to return home with his brothers, He decided that they were innocent and that what happened was the result of self-defense.

But things do not go back to normal after this, Ponyboy becomes very absent-minded and depressed. His grades have plummeted and he’s lost his appetite, memory, and coordination, and he has started fighting with Darry again. Since he’s failing, his English teacher makes a deal with him. The deal was if Ponyboy could write an outstanding autobiographical theme, then he could raise his grade to a C. Sodapop tells Ponyboy that he feels frustrated and upset because of all the fighting, in tears, he pleads with Ponyboy and Darry to stop the fighting. The two promise to try their best. At home, Ponyboy realizes he wants to share the story of him and his friends, so he begins to work on his English theme which is revealed to be the novel the audience is reading.

Overall Opinion

I chose this book because I wanted a book that would be fun and captivating, something I didn't want to put down. As I began reading, I became completely sucked into the storyline and the characters. This novel had me feeling a strong connection to the characters and made me elicited a wide range of emotions. I was completely immersed in the story and felt a connection to the characters. They formed close friendships with one another and each had their unique strengths. They were uneasy and worried about life and their future just like most teenagers. I would without a doubt recommend this book to my classmates, especially to anyone interested in young adult fiction, I believe this book would especially help relate to those who might have similar problems such as depression and drama in their lives. I would rate this novel a 4 out of 5 and believe it would be best suited for people ages 12 and up.

What I liked about this book was that it was told from Ponyboy's perspective, it gave me an insight into his thoughts and feelings. This was an extremely captivating book that made me go through many ups and downs, keeping me at the edge of my seat after every page I turned to the end. For example, I never would've guessed a sweet, innocent kid like Johnny would end up killing Bob and that Dally would ever do what he did to himself. The one thing I disliked about the book was that there were too many characters and some I believe were unnecessary. This book has many valuable lessons that can be learned especially toward the end. One thing that the main character begins to realize is that violence does not solve problems and simply adds to them. He learns the importance of tolerance and realizes that he has more in common with the socs than he previously assumed. Throughout the novel, there are shown to be many themes, the most important being the themes of empathy, self-sacrifice, honor, family, and not judging a book by its cover. My favorite among these themes had to be family. This book shows that family doesn’t have to be blood, what makes up a family is the strong bonds you make with others. I loved this book and I hope others will read it and enjoy it as much as I did.