Soda As A Hero In 'The Outsider'

When you think of a hero, who do you imagine? Do you envision a strong, caped figure fighting a terrible villain, bringing justice to a doomed city? I see that too, but when I think of a hero from The Outsiders, there are many boys I can think of. To determine who I think is the most heroic, I seek out the one with the most of these qualities: courage, loyalty, and compassion. The character who seems the most fitting to this definition for me is Sodapop Curtis.

Being the middle child, Soda is the in middle of his family and their fights, making it necessary for him to be courageous. Ponyboy and Darry were arguing- again. During all this, Soda had been soaking it up, until he just couldn’t take it anymore. He bolted out of the house, his brothers at his heels. Later, Soda rants to his brothers, “‘...I’m the middleman in tug o’ war and I’m being split in half’” (Hinton 175). As a peacemaker, Soda can’t stand it when his brothers fight, and it makes him feel as though he is being torn in two. He is brave to express what he has endured to his brothers and to bond his family together, and that courage is one of many things that makes him a hero.

Along with being brave and pulling his family together, Soda is constantly displaying his relentless compassion. This is established when Ponyboy is talking about each of

Just after Soda escaped the quarreling between his brothers, Darry explains to Pony why Soda was worked up even before they argued. Darry confides in Pony this: “‘He wanted to marry her anyway, but she just left’”(Hinton 174). Sandy, Soda’s girlfriend, had been cheating on him and was going to have a child, so she went to Florida. Soda sent her a letter saying that he would marry her, and therefore, sacrifice his future for her, even though she betrayed him. This, to me, shows Soda’s ultimate virtue of heroism through his love and loyalty towards