S.E. Hinton Quotes

Stay gold Ponyboy. Stay gold.

--Johnny quoting Robert Frost

He meant you are gold when you're a kid, like green. When you're a kid everything is new, dawn. It's just. Like the way you dig sunsets, Pony. That's gold.

If you enjoy reading something, read it.

The way Two-Bit, after the police had taken Dally's body away, had griped because he had lost his switchblade when they searched Dallas.
¨Is that all that's bothering you, that switchblade?¨ a red-eyed Steve had snapped at him.
¨No,¨ Two-Bit had said with a quivering sigh, ¨but that's what I'm wishing was all that's bothering me.¨

I was desperate for something to read that dealt realistically with teenage life, and I thought others might be, too.

Mace, you never read Smoky the Cowhorse,did you?
No.
Well,ol' Smoky, he had somebad things happen to him,had the heart knocked clean out of him.But he hung on and came out of it okay.I've been bashed up pretty good,Mason, but I'm going to make it.

You take up for your buddies, no matter what they do. When you're a gang, you stick up for the members. If you don't stick up for them, stick together, make like brothers, it isn't a gang anymore. It's a pack. A snarling, distrustful, bickering park like the Socs in their social clubs or the street gangs in New York or the wolves in the timber.

Juvenile delinquent, you're no good! Darry shouted.

Greasers will still be greasers and Socs will still be Socs. Sometimes I think it's the ones in the middle that are really the lucky stiffs.

I go straight from thinking about my narrator to being him.

But I've never regretted it. You can't regret experience.

I knew he would be dead, because Dally Winston wanted to be dead and he always got what he wanted.

Sixteen years on the streets and you can learn a lot. But all the wrong things, not the things you want to learn. Sixteen years on the streets and you see a lot. But all the wrong sights, not the things you want to see.

He'll have to do without me, Jamie thought, not looking back. And then clearly, as if he'd been told, he knew Grenville /could/ do without him. There was somewhere else he had to go now, somewhere else he had to be.

You get tough like me and you don't get hurt. You look out for yourself and nothin' can touch you ...

What's the safest thing to be when one is met by a gang of social outcasts in an alley? ... No, another social outcast!

Some people go, some people stay. I'm staying.

I grew up here and my friends are here. There's nothing wrong with here.

I gotta cut smoking or I'll never make track next year

Ponyboy, I asked the nurse to give you this book so you could finish it. The doctor came in a while ago but I knew anyway. I keep getting tireder and tireder. Listen, I don't mind dying now. It's worth it. It's worth saving those kids. Their lives are worth more then mine, they have more to live for. Some of their parents came by to thank me and I know it was worth it. Tell Dally it's worth it. I'm just going to miss you guys. I've been thinking about it, and that poem, that guy that wrote it, he meant you're gold when you're a kid, like green. When you're a kid everything's new, dawn. It's just when you get used to everything that it's day. Like the way you dig sunsets, Pony. That's gold. Keep that way, it's a good way to be. I want you to tell Dally to look at one. He'll probably think you're crazy but ask for me. I don't think he's ever really seen a sunset. And don't be so bugged over being a greaser. You still have a lot of time to make yourself be what you want. There's still lots of good in the world. Tell Dally. I don't think he knows.
Your buddy,

Johnny

When I see a movie with someone it's kind of uncomfortable.

Nothing can wear you out like caring about people

But we can't be everything we read.

I think that 'The Outsiders' was meant to be written, and I was just picked to write it.

It was too late to tell Dally. Would he have listened? I doubted it. Suddenly it wasn't only a personal thing to me. I could picture hundreds and hundreds of boys living on the wrong sides of cities, boys with black eyes who jumped at their own shadows. Hundreds of boys who maybe watched sunsets and looked at stars and ached for something better. I could see boys going under street lights because they were mean and tough and hated the world, and it was too late to tell them that there was still good in it, and they wouldn't believe you if you did. It was too much of a problem to be just a personal thing.

Movies can't ruin books. They can only ruin movies.

I used to be sure of things. Me, once i had all the answers. I wish i was a kid again, when i had all the answers

We had played a kid's version of gang fighting called "Civil War," and then later we had got in on the real thing, we fought with chains and we fought barefisted and we fought Socs and we fought other grease gangs. It was a normal childhood.

Oh, glory," I said with a groan, "this is all I need to top off a perfect night" I took one last drag on my weed and ground the stub under my heel

Need a haircut, greaser?

I guess I just couldn't see standing there
alive, talking, thinking, breathing, being
one second, and dead the next. It really bothered me. Death by violence isn't the same as dying any other way, accident or disease or old age. It just ain't the same.

The thing is, the Tulsa experience that I wrote about in 'The Outsiders' is closer to the universal experience than it would be if I wrote it from L.A. or New York. It's an everyman story.

Rat race is the perfect name for it,' she said. 'We're always going and going and going, and never asking where. Did you ever hear of having more than you wanted? So that you couldn't want anything else and then started looking for something else to want? It seems like we're always searching for something to satisfy is, and never finding it. Maybe if we could lose our cool we would.

You greasers have a different set of values. You're more emotional. We're sophisticated-cool to the point of not feeling anything. Nothing is real with us.

People get hurt in rumbles, maybe killed. I'm sick of it because it doesn't do any good. You can't win ... even if you whip us. You'll still be where you were before- at the bottom. And we'll still be the lucky ones with all the breaks. So it doesn't do any good, the fighting and the killing. It doesn't prove a thing.

Pg.1- "I have light brown, almost red hair and greenish-grey eyes. I wish they were more grey, because I hate most guys that have green eyes, but I have to be content with what I have."
pg ?- "Can you see the sunset real good from the west side?" She blinked, startled, then smiled. "Real good."
"You can see it from the east side, too," I said quietly.
"Thanks, Ponyboy." She smiled through her tears. "You dig okay."
She had green eyes. I went on, walking home slowly.

I like having a private name and a public name. It helps keep things straight.

When I was young, all the books were about a Mary Jane and the football player and the prom and ending up with the quiet guy and making your mom happy.

Greaser ... greaser ... greaser ... " Steve singsonged. "O victim of environment, underprivileged, rotten, no-count hood!

There was a silent moment when everything held its breath, and then the sun rose.

If you're going to lead people, you have to have somewhere to go.

Anything you read can influence your work, so I try to read good stuff.

Maybe people are younger when they sleep.

You read a lot, don't you, Ponyboy?"
I was startled. "Yeah, why?"
"I could just tell. I'll bet you watch sunsets, too.

Johnny, you don't know what a few months in jail can do to you, man. You get mean in jail, I just don't wanna see that happen to you like it happened to me, man. Understand?"-Dallas Winston

Dally didn't die a hero. He died violent and young and desperate, just like we all knew he'd die someday. Just like Tim Shepard and Curly Shepard and the Brumly boys and the other guys we knew would die someday. But Johnny was right. He died gallant.

Get smart and nothing can touch you.

Writer's were supposed to be a litte crazy

But if you used to walls all that air can give you the creeps

If you want to see something funny, it's a tough hood sticking his tongue out at his big brother.

I always try to write the best I can.

'The Outsiders' cast in particular was a joy to be around - sweet kids, normal goofy teenagers off camera and serious artists on. They were great. I never got them mixed up with the characters, though. Each of them had his own strong personality.

I advise writing to oneself. If you don't want to read it, nobody else is going to read it.

If you want to be a writer, I have two pieces of advice. One is to be a reader. I think that's one of the most important parts of learning to write. The other piece of advice is 'Just do it!' Don't think about it, don't agonize, sit down and write.

I never base a character on someone I know. You can get ideas from real life, but every character you write is some aspect of yourself.

All of a sudden it felt like people were peering over my shoulder, wondering what I would write next. I was blocked for four years.

I´d rather have anybody´s hate than their pity

let's do it for Johnny

That's why people don't ever think to blame the Socs and are always ready to jump on us. We look hoody and they look decent. It could be just the other way around - half of the hoods I know are pretty decent guys underneath all that grease, and from what I've heard, a lot of Socs are just cold-blooded mean - but people usually go by looks.

But Dally, heaters kill people!
Ya' kill 'em with switchblades to, don'tcha?

They grew up on the outside of society. They weren't looking for a fight. They were looking to belong.

It's okay. We aren't in the same class. Just don't forget that some of us watch the sunset too.

In our neighborhood it's rare to find a kid who doesn't drink once in a while. But Soda never touches a drop - he doesn't need to. He gets drunk on just plain living.

Nature's first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay.

Some of us never cry at al. Like Dally and Two-Bit and Tim Shepard--they forgot how at an early age.

My husband and I get along great. We're both introverts, and it's hard to make new friends.

We saw the same sunset.

Ponyboy, listen, don't get tough. You're not like the rest of us and don't try to be ... "
What was the matter with Two-Bit? I knew as well as he did that if you got tough you didn't get hurt. Get smart and nothing can touch you ...
"What in the world are you doing?" Two-Bit's voice broke into my thoughts.
I looked up at him. "Picking up the glass."
He stared at me for a second, then grinned. "You little sonofagun," he said in a relieved voice. I didn't know what he was talking about, so I just went on picking up the glass from the bottle end and put it in a trash can. I didn't want anyone to get a flat tire.

I grew up with my cousins, who were as close as brothers, and frankly, I didn't like what girls were expected to do. I liked horseback riding, playing football, going to rodeos. I wanted to be in jeans all the time, and I couldn't figure out why I was supposed to conform to a certain standard, so I didn't.

I liked my books and clouds and sunsets.

I am a greaser," Sodapop chanted. "I am a JD and a hood. I blacken the name of our fair city. I beat up people. I rob gas stations. I am a menace to society. Man, do I have fun!"
"Greaser ... greaser ... greaser ... "Steve singsonged. "O, victim of enviornment, underprivelaged, rotton no-count hood!"
Juvenile delinquent, you're no good!" Darry shouted.
Get thee hence, white trash," Two-Bit said in asnobbish voice. "I am a Soc. I am the privelaged and the well-dressed. I throw beer blasts, drive fancy cars, break windows at fancy parties."
And what do you do for fun?" I inquired in a serious, awed voice.
I jump greasers!" Two-Bit screamed, and did a cartwheel.

I've been thinking about it, and that poem, that guy that wrote it, he meant you're gold when you're a kid, like green. When you're a kid everything's new, dawn. It's just when you get used to everything that it's day. Like the way you dig sunsets, Pony. That's gold. Keep that way, it's a good way to be.

I can lie so easily that it spooks me sometimes - Soda says it comes form reading so much. But then, Two-Bit lias all the time too, and he never opens a book.

More people thought I was strange because I was a teenage novelist, not because I was from Oklahoma. That's where I got the looks like I was from the zoo.

I have no idea why I write. The old standards are: I like to express my feelings, stretch my imagination, earn money.

'The Outsiders' died on the vine being sold as a drugstore paperback.

I don't know why I go to school unless for kicks, oh well might as well do dissect a frog.

My characters are fictional. I get ideas from real people, sometimes, but my characters always exist only in my head.

It goes so fast, he thought, they don't tell you that, how fast it goes ...

I find it to be easier to write from a man's point of view.

why do you like fights Darry~Ponyboy
He just likes to show off his muscles~Sodapop

It's not just money. Part of it is, but not all. You greasers have a different set of values. You're more emotional. We're sophistocated- cool to the point of not feeling anything. Nothing is for real with us. You know sometimes I'll catch myself talking to a girl-friend, and realise i don't mean half of what I'm saying. I don't really think a beer blast on the river bottom is supercool, but I'll rave about one to a girl-friend just to be saying something.

Nothing Stay Forever"
"Nature's first green is gold,
"Her hardest hue to hold.
"Her early leaf's a flower;
"But only so an hour.
"Then leaf subsides to leaf.
"So Eden sank to grief,
"So dawn goes down today.
"Nothing gold can stay.
Robert Frost

"Nature's first green" title="S.E. Hinton Quotes: Nothing Stay Forever"
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I'm not saying that either Socs or greasers are better; that's just the way things are.

I'm a good judge of my own work.

I just felt being part of my peer group so strongly. I was immersed in teen culture, but not taken in by it.

My stomach gave a violent start and turned into a hunk of ice. The world was spinning around me, and blobs of faces and visions of things past were dancing in the red mist that covered the lot. It swirled into a mass of colors and I felt myself swaying on my feet. Someone cried, "Glory, look at the kid!"
And the ground rushed up to meet me very suddenly.

Uh, Miss Carlson," I said, standing at her desk after everybody else had gone on to their next class, "somebody told me you went to that guy's funeral the one the highway patrol shot."
"Yes," SHe said. "I did."
She didn't look like she was mad at me about it. She had real long eyelashes. I bet she was good-looking when she was young.
"Was he a relative or something?" That was what I was afraid of.
"No. Not even a friend really." She paused, like she was hunting for the right words. Finally she said, "I read a book once that ended with the words 'the incommunicable past' You can only share the past with someone who's shared it with you. So I can't explain to you what Mark was to me, exactly. I knew him a long time ago.

In the daytime you aren't afraid of anything.

Stay gold, Ponyboy. Stay gold . . . The pillow seemed to sink a little, and Johnny died. You read about people looking

Mason is ambidextrous. That means that he can use either his right or left hand. For some reason, when I was little, I thought that meant he was part water lizard. Don't ask why.

I could write and help a lot of kids, or teach and help a few and go nuts.

You still have a lot of time to make yourself be what you want. There's still lots of good in the world. Tell Dally. I don't think he knows.

It ain't fair that we have all the rough breaks!

I didn't think much about that statement then. But later I would-I still do. I think about it and think about it until I think I'm going crazy.

He sure put things into words good.

We couldn't get along without him. We needed Johnny as much as he needed the gang. And for the same reason.

If you're going to lead people, you've got to have somewhere to go.

Yeah," I said. "And I'm gonna look just like him."
The black cat paused and looked me over.
"No you ain't baby. That cat is a prince, man. He is royalty in exile. You ain't never gonna look like that.

Asleep, he looked a lot younger than going-on-seventeen, but I had noticed that Johnny looked younger when he was asleep too, so I figured everyone did. Maybe people are younger when they are asleep.