The Outsiders: what does it mean to "stay gold"?

A group of rich kids jump a boy making his way home from the movies for no other reason than his notable preference to keep his hair long and style it greased.

This is both the very real incident which sparked S.E Hinton's 1967 work, and the first in a multitude of fights which hurtles readers into the world of The Outsiders, Ponyboy Curtis and his simultaneous resentment and reinforcement of the rigid social divide in 1960's Tulsa, Oklahoma.

I have heard countless stories of this novel and Francis Ford Coppolas 1983 adaptation, but until this week I had neither read nor watched them and knew relatively nothing about either.

Although it was not among my own required reading, Hinton's first work is a book found on a huge number of year 7/8 curriculums, and understandably so. Commonly assigned around the time where strict social groups become apparent and reading is largely the last priority of many adolescents, the novels immediate discussion of class and its divisions reflects the overwhelming emotions of high school cliques and the struggle to find your place alongside a fast-paced narrative in a short piece of writing that can maintain the attention of younger readers.

Despite my awareness of the title, its acclaim and impact, like most books that we are told we need to read - either directly by a teacher, or the whisperings of wider society - we can loose the desire to actually read them. This is coming from a girl who loved English, but the novels that I have read, initially appreciated and have then gone on to study are largely tainted by memories of scrounging for quotes that supported my interpretations, constantly rewording contentions and never having enough space or time in an essay to address the full context of a novel, and I don’t know if I will ever read those books again. So while I am sure reading it at that assigned age would have been highly influential, I am somewhat glad that I have come across it now and upon my own accord.

The Outsiders stages the story of two warring youth gangs fiercely divided by wealth, geography and social standing across the east and west ends of 1967 Tulsa Oklahoma. On the east side sits the working class, underprivileged Greasers to which our 14 year old narrator Ponyboy belongs and the on the west, there are the wealthy Socs (so-shes) both of which are thrown into turmoil when their relentless conflict ultimately turns lethal.

In its most basic essence The Outsiders is a novel that explores this class system and at the forefront is Hinton's criticism of its baselessness, that really when you strip back the arbitrary dividers of class these groups aren't all that different from each other.

Ponyboy initially relays his world in black and white, The Socs have it easy, with no worries he could possibly conceive, they've got "all the breaks and even whipping them [wouldn't] change that fact". For himself and his circle he feels duped, treated indecently based on factors he cannot control and which he does not accept make him lesser.

"We were as good as they were; it wasn't our fault we were greasers"

He has an intense curiosity for the life of a Soc, questioning it both directly and within his own monologues throughout the entirety of the text, almost desperate to find things in common with an opposition perceived as superior and positive, desperate to believe that he too could embrace that same comfort, that he could be successful and good, should he possess one of their qualities.

In consequence, his questions are indeed answered but present him with a confronting reality of their likeness. That the Soc and Greaser are similar because both are subject to struggle, that it "is rough all over" and in actuality, greasers do not have a monopoly over adversity. Pony cannot immediately accept that disillusionment, instead over the course of the text we observe him comes to terms with the ideas that wealth does not protect a person from pain and good opinion cannot excuse a human being from hardship. For suffering is a human experience, and while we may all be superficially different there are elements of us all that are concurrently and fundamentally the same because we are human.

So yes, The Outsiders is a commentary on class and the deconstruction of division, but beyond that I find it to be a story about childhood, its fantastical associations and the impossibility of preserving its innocence while existing in a world that punishes you for it, and this concept is introduced from the very first line

"When I stepped out into the bright sunlight from the darkness of the movie house, I had only two things on my mind: Paul Newman and a ride home"

From the get go, we are told that Ponyboy has one foot in reality and one foot in his Imagination, always lost in his head and constantly shifting from sharing the central conflict then jumping around and into stories of the past. Where Childhood is elsewhere intrinsically soft, a place for experimentation and learning, in the world of The Outsiders we must acknowledge that it is dangerous.

For the Greasers, Innocence is volatile. It leaves them vulnerable and as a consequence we watch them abandon childhood early in order to protect themselves and the family they have made. They take on adult responsibility, stepping into roles of surrogate parents, full time workers and for the most part lose all sense of fascination with a world that has only shown them ugly.

For that reason it is ridiculously easy to forget that these boys are in fact not adults. They do not complain about the situation nor do they suggest there is any other option, thus elements of their juvenile nature emerge in more subtle ways. They're having daily chocolate cake for breakfast and they literally backflip and cartwheel their way to the climactic rumble of the text, communicating that while they may not be able to embrace their youth they are truly just children attempting to navigate a cruel reality.

And perhaps through the opposing reactions to this cruelty we can understand what Hinton means when she says "stay gold"

We Can Take Dally, who has built a hardened "Tougher, Colder & Meaner" exterior then the rest of his kith to protect himself from a world that has constantly abused and neglected him and thus introduce the concept of "wising up" or shutting down your emotions as a means of preservation.

Deny the opportunity for a cruel world to have beauty in it.

Alternatively, we can look to Johnny, given every reason to perceive the world as ugly he is intent on locating its allure. Not to let the hardship he has faced taint his opinion of the world.

Through Johnny we can understand that while you cannot avoid cruelty in the world, it will bash you around, challenge you and maybe even try to break you, you can still seek its beauty, softness and you can still be gold.

Because gold itself is a maleable metal, bending and soft. It is mined, whipped from the earth, taken to the surface, crushed so it may be seperated from its surroundings and placed under intense flame so it may become pure. Gold doesn't tarnish, It resists acid and corrosion, it can scratch and will still sparkle.

So maybe staying and seeking gold is not about remaining perfectly intact, nor is it maintaining innocence or thinking the world cannot be brutal. Maybe Staying gold is simply a dedication to approaching cruelty with kindness without expecting it in return.

For such a short novel there is so much more I could talk about, but I will leave it here.

Stay Gold lovelies

-AUDS