Guide to The Outsiders

The Outsiders Characters and Their Ages: Ponyboy, Johnny, Dally, Sodapop and the Greasers

Seven greasers, a handful of Socs, and the ages that make the story hit so hard

By Tori BooksUpdated November 20267 min readContains spoilers

S. E. Hinton

Every character and how old they are

Ponyboy describes his gang the way you would describe your own family: who is funny, who is the toughest, who you would call at three in the morning. They are not a gang in the criminal sense so much as a group of poor kids from the East Side who look after each other because nobody else will.

Start with the narrator and work outward, and by the time you reach the rich kids across town, you can see why the two sides never stood a chance of understanding each other.

Who is Ponyboy Curtis?

Ponyboy is fourteen and tells the whole story. He is the youngest of the gang, a good student who runs track, loves old movies and reads Great Expectations and Gone with the Wind. He notices sunsets that nobody else bothers to look at. He wears his hair long and greased like the others, but he often feels he does not quite fit anywhere, which is what makes the book so recognizable to teenage readers.

His parents were killed in a car crash not long before the story begins, and he lives with his two older brothers on condition that they stay out of trouble. One more scrape, and the state could split them up.

Who is Sodapop Curtis?

Soda is sixteen, going on seventeen, and he is the brother everyone loves: handsome, funny, impossible to stay angry with. He dropped out of school and works at a gas station with his best friend Steve, and he plans to marry his girlfriend Sandy until she moves away to Florida. He is also the one who feels most torn when Ponyboy and Darry fight.

Who is Darry Curtis?

Darry is twenty. He was a football star with a chance at college, gave it up when their parents died and now works long hours roofing houses to keep the family together. To Ponyboy he seems hard and cold, always yelling about grades and curfews. One of the book's great turns is Ponyboy's realization that Darry is not hard at all, just terrified of losing another person he loves.

Who is Johnny Cade?

Johnny is sixteen, small and quiet, with big dark eyes, and the whole gang protects him. His parents neglect and mistreat him, and a few months before the story a group of Socs beat him badly, so he now carries a switchblade and flinches at every shadow. Under the fear he is brave and thoughtful, and the night in the park changes his life and everyone else's.

Who is Dally Winston?

Dallas Winston, called Dally, is seventeen and the toughest of them all. He grew up wild in New York, has already been in and out of jail and seems to care about nothing. The exception is Johnny, the one person he would do anything for. Dally is the friend the boys run to when they are in real trouble, and he is the one who knows exactly what to do.

Who is Two-Bit Mathews?

Keith Mathews is called Two-Bit because he always has to add his two cents. At eighteen and a half he is the oldest of the gang apart from Darry, and he is still a junior in high school. He is the joker, famous for his wisecracks, his shoplifting and his black-handled switchblade, and he keeps things light even when they are not.

Who is Steve Randle?

Steve is seventeen, tall and lean, and a genius with cars. He has been Soda's best friend since grade school and works with him at the gas station. He thinks of Ponyboy as Soda's tagalong kid brother, but he is loyal to the gang when it counts.

Who are Cherry, Marcia, Bob and Randy?

Cherry Valance is a cheerleader with red hair who talks honestly with Ponyboy at the drive-in and becomes the bridge between the two sides. Her friend Marcia is lighter and funnier. Bob Sheldon, Cherry's boyfriend, is the Soc who beat Johnny months earlier and wears heavy rings on his hands. Randy Adderson is Marcia's boyfriend and Bob's best friend, and his conversation with Ponyboy before the big fight is one of the most important in the book.

Socs is short for Socials. They are the kids from the West Side with money, nice cars and madras shirts. The greasers come from the poorer East Side.

Who else should you know?

Tim Shepard leads another greaser gang that joins the rumble. Buck Merrill is Dally's rodeo partner, at whose house a party is held. Jerry Wood is the teacher who stays with Ponyboy after the fire, and Mr. Syme is the English teacher whose assignment turns into the book you are reading.

Why do the characters' ages matter so much?

Look at the table again. The boys who fight, run, hold down jobs and bury their friends are fourteen to twenty. Darry is raising two brothers at an age when most people are still in college. S. E. Hinton was a teenager herself when she wrote the novel, and that is the whole point: the book shows how young these boys are, and how much they have already lost.

More about The Outsiders

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This guide discusses the whole plot, including the ending.