“The dynamic transition of Ponyboy”

“This is a formative essay on how Ponyboy Curtis is a dynamic character, which means that he will change throughout the story.”


Have you ever had a time in your life where you were completely innocent and then you did something wrong, it made you worse, and then you regained it again? Ponyboy from the book “The Outsiders” by S.E. Hinton, is a dynamic character, because he changes throughout the story. Ponyboy goes from being innocent, to losing his innocence, then getting it back again, that is how Ponyboy is a dynamic character. It is always good to regain you innocence somewhere in time, because it can make you a better person, to the people around you, your family and friends, and it’s just good for you in general.
In the beginning of the story from about chapters 1-4, Ponyboy Curtis the main character and narrator of the story, is completely innocent. Ponyboy has done no harm to anyone around him, he’s just a boy in a messed up world. He lives with his brothers, because his parents died in a bad car accident, his brothers are all he has in his life. Ponyboy is part of a gang called the Greasers; they have a rival gang called the Socials or Socs for short. Being the youngest member in the group he just follows in the footsteps of his brothers, which are also a part of the gang. So far Ponyboy is innocent and he has done no wrong to anyone, he’s just being a young 14 year old teenager living his life.

In chapter 4, this is where Ponyboy loses all of his innocence. Ponyboy loses it when Johnny and him are walking by this one park, then all of sudden a blue mustang comes speeding up towards them and then a group of socs got out including Bob and Randy from earlier that night. Then Bob grabs Ponyboy and starts drowning him in a nearby fountain, and then Ponyboy passes out. We don’t know what happens in the meantime because Ponyboy is the main character. Once he wakes up he notices Bob laying on the ground dead and Johnny holding a bloody switchblade in his hand, which is where Ponyboy loses all of his innocence. Everything is now bad for Ponyboy and Johnny, they are running from the law and they end up hiding in an old abandon church. That is not the life a 14 and a 16 year old should have, but I guess that’s what you kind of get for taking the wrong path and creating a gang like that. Yeah I know they don’t have families but you could still take the right path.

Now a little bit farther into the book Ponyboy regains his innocence, when him and Johnny save these kids from a burning church. He figures out that this is pretty much the end for Johnny, and because Johnny got hurt really bad when he was saving the kids, it ended up taking his life. The last words Johnny said to Ponyboy in the book was “Stay gold Ponyboy, stay gold”, to my opinion I believe that Ponyboy changed and gained back his innocence when he saved those kids from the burning fire and once Johnny died. Ponyboy was starting to get really close with Jonny then he just dies, that was really hard for Ponyboy. Ponyboy finally started to believing in himself more and got his innocence back which made him think that what he has been doing in his life is bad, so he decided to take the right path.

In the end Ponyboy regains his innocence and everything goes back to somewhat normal, just three people less in the world. You can’t keep your innocence forever, but when you lose it, it is possible to retract it and gain it once again.