Character Analysis: The Outsiders

What makes a hero? Are heroes wise and make smart choices, are they selfless, are they superheroes, are they Robin hoods, can they be both good and bad? Indeed, they may be, and there are many examples of these heroes in the Outsiders. The Outsiders a coming of age novel by S.E Hinton is about Ponyboy Curtis (the narrator) and how he struggles with the right and wrong in his society in which he believes that he is an outsider. A teen gang in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the Greasers, named after the members' long greasy hair, are perpetually contending the Socials, a rival group of rich kids, from the opposite/West-side of town. When greaser buddies, Ponyboy and Johnny get jumped and pulverized by the Socs, Johnny kills Bob the Soc. Soon Ponyboy and Johnny,

According to the book this was Johnny before his heroic acts, “If you can picture a little dark puppy that has been kicked too many times and is lost in a crowd of strangers, you’ll have Johnny” (Hinton 11). Johnny was neither a hero or a bad guy in the beginning, he was very soft, nervous, and shy. This is because of his past experiences of being jumped by Bob himself, but in the burning church a new Johnny was foreseen. According to the passage, “I caught one look at his face; it was red- marked from falling embers and sweat-streaked, but he grinned at me. He wasn’t scared either” (Hinton 92). Johnny is the best example of a hero because he shows the heroic qualities of bravery, because he had no fear, and selflessness because he didn’t care which child bit him or he didn’t worry about making it out, he just had one goal: to make sure everyone was safe and out of harm’s way. It was like his heroic qualities were in disguise. He may have been the last one in the burning church after Pony, but he was still the last one