Growing Up In The Outsiders By S. E. Hinton

Many people underestimate the struggle and change of maturing and growing up. It can feel different and be almost like an out-of-body experience. S.E. Hinton does an exceptional job at capturing what growing up and developing is like in The Outsiders. Ponyboy Curtis, a 14 year-old that is part of the Greaser gang, is undergoing a time of development in the story, and one can really see the difficulty that Ponyboy has to endure during that process. Although Ponyboy has to go through this process, he changes significantly, and becomes different in the way he acts and lives. To start, Ponyboy becomes tougher in The Outsiders as the story progresses. One way he becomes tougher is from all of the gang fights with the Socs. Near the end of the story after Johnny dies, Ponyboy says to the Socs that are looking for a fight, “I’ve had about all I can take from you guys. Now you get back into your car or you’ll get split” (171). Ponyboy also got tougher from the church fire when he went in to save the children. When Pony and Johnny are in Windrixville, Pony sees the fire as

Ponyboy becomes less afraid of Darry when he realizes that Darry actually does love him. After Ponyboy gets to see Darry when he is taken to the hospital because of the church fire, Darry is standing outside waiting for him. On page 96 Ponyboy writes, Suddenly I realized, horrified, that Darry was crying... Darry did care about me, maybe as much as he cared about Soda. Ponyboy also becomes less afraid of Darry when he starts fighting back when Darry yells at him. When Ponyboy starts school again after getting home from the hospital, he and Darry get into a fuss, about the fourth one they’d had that week. Ponyboy shouts, “What’s the sweat about my schoolwork... I’ll have to get a job as soon as I get out of school... you can just lay off!” (173) These two reasons prove that Ponyboy becomes less afraid of Darry as the story