The Outsiders (novel)

The Outsiders

First hardcover edition, 1967
Author	S. E. Hinton
Cover artist	Robert Hunt
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Young adult fiction
Publisher	Viking Press, Dell Publishing
Publication date	April 24, 1967
Media type	Print (hardcover, paperback), Audiobook
Pages	192
ISBN	0-670-53257-6
OCLC	64396432
Followed by	That Was Then, This Is Now

The Outsiders is a coming-of-age novel by S.E. Hinton published in 1967 by Viking Press. The book details the conflict between two rival gangs of White Americans divided by their socioeconomic status: the working-class "Greasers" and the upper-middle-class "Socs" (pronounced /ˈsoʊʃɪz/—short for Socials). The story is told in first-person perspective by teenage protagonist Ponyboy Curtis, and takes place in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1965,^[1] although this is never explicitly stated in the book.

Hinton began writing the novel when she was 15 and wrote the bulk of it when she was 16 and a junior in high school.^[2] She was 18 when the book was published.^[1] She released the work using her initials rather than her feminine given names (Susan Eloise) so that her gender would not lead male book reviewers to dismiss the work.^[3]

A film adaptation was produced in 1983 by Francis Ford Coppola, and a short-lived television series appeared in 1990, picking up where the movie left off. A dramatic stage adaptation was written by Christopher Sergel and published in 1990. A stage musical adaptation of the same name premiered on Broadway in 2024.^[4]