Author’s Note:
This is a point of view response on The
Outsiders by: S.E. Hinton. It analyzes the main character, or Ponyboy's point
of view.
Ponyboy’s Point of View
In
The Outsiders by: S.E. Hinton, there
are two rival gangs of teenagers; the greasers and the Socs (socials). The Socs
drive around in their mustang’s jumping greasers. Ponyboy and Johnny, who are young
greasers get jumped one day while trying to run away from home. Johnny loses his
cool and kills a Soc, therefore they have no choice but to leave their already
broken households. This story is written in Ponyboy’s point of view. From
Ponyboy’s point of view, characters in the story are described in a way that
allows the reader to understand the other characters, in a way perspectives of
others wouldn’t allow.
One
way that the perspective of the story would change was during the scene when Ponyboy
gets slapped by his older brother Darry. In Ponyboy’s perspective Darry is no
fun, he also thinks that Darry hates him, finally he thinks that Darry is just
a workaholic. What Ponyboy doesn’t know is if Darry stopped working they
would not be able to afford living costs. When both of their parents died in a
tragic car accident Darry had to pass up on a football scholarship so he could support his family. If this particular scene was told from Darry’s point of
view, it would tremendously alter the reader’s thoughts on the situation. Someone
who read The Outsiders would then be
thinking about how mad Darry was and not about how much Ponyboy hated his
brother. The reader would also be feeling bad for him because he was trying to help Ponyboy but Ponyboy never
listened to him, but as the story is told from Ponyboy’s point of view it makes
Darry seem like the bad guy in all scenes.
This
book would be changed a lot if it was written in Darry’s point of view. Some of
the scenes would not be in the book and others would be completely different.
One scene specifically would be altered greatly would be the scene when Ponyboy and Johnny had already run away and Darry had to figure out what to do. The reader would experience the intense emotion that Darry was feeling. Also the reader would
not be able to listen to Sodapop talk to Darry. Additionaly if Darry knew that Ponyboy went to Dally he would have been even more
scared because he would have known that Dally gave Ponyboy and Johnny a gun. Overall the whole book would be extremely different.
