Writing Resources
The only lines that divide us are the ones we draw In our society today people are constantly divided into categories ranks and labels It is our natural human character to judge classify and categorize every person if we know them or not When S E Hinton s novel The Outsiders first hit the hands of readers in 1967 it told the story of the real world The real world that continually divided and labeled every person and group contrary to anything that had been written about before In 1920s Tulsa Oklahoma there is a line running down the middle of the city dividing it into the east and west sides This line is more than a simple city boundary but a line that separates the blue Mustangs from the stolen souped up Chevys This line separates the button up tops and khakis form the ripped jeans and plaids But most importantly it separates two gangs These gangs are known to be as the Socials and the Greasers Ponyboy Curtis and his brothers live and belong to the Greasers and with that comes the daily struggles of living in poverty and fighting against Socs Not only do they fight the west side but they must defeat stereotypes labels and harsh social views When Ponyboy Curtis and Johnny Cade end up with a murder on their hands it not only affects them their friends and the people around them but teaches them how sometimes the only line between them is city lines In the novel
