William Ellery Channing, the foremost Unitarian preacher in the United States in the early nineteenth century, once said, “Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage. The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.” S.E. Hinton shows this in her novel The Outsiders when the main character Ponyboy Curtis faces three major types of conflicts. He deals with conflicts with other people, skirmishes with society, and struggles within himself. These challenges shape Ponyboy into the man he will be for the rest of his life. One type of conflict Ponyboy faces is man versus man. The first example of this type of conflict is with his brother Darry. Ponyboy feels his brother Darry does not care for him. On page 50, the narrator says “He’s [Darry]…show more content… First of all, there is a Soc girl named Cherry whom Ponyboy really likes, and he must decide to tell Cherry how he feels or to not tell. “Nobody but Soda could really get me talking. Till I met Cherry Valance.” This quote proves the narrator likes Cherry’s company and feels comfortable talking to her. Ponyboy feels like he understands Cherry well. But in the end, the narrator does not tell Cherry how he feels, and she never knows. He does not tell because he learns Cherry likes a type of person that Pony is not. This is shown in the novel when Cherry tells Pony she would fall in love with Dally if she ever saw him again. Another example of internal conflict the narrator has to face is to decide what he wants to become. He can stay a Greaser or he can do something with his life and move out of the bad neighborhood and go somewhere. “We’re Greasers, but not hoods, and we don’t belong to this group of future convicts. We could end up like them, I thought. We could. And that didn’t help my headache”(pg.149). During the rumble, an organized fight, Ponyboy sees other groups of Greasers. He realizes he’s not like them. Pony hates to fight while other Greasers see fighting as an enjoyable game. But the narrator also realizes he could eventually become one of them. “He’s [Darry] going somewhere. And I was going to be just like him. I wasn’t going to live in a lousy neighborhood all my life”(pg.146). Ponyboy also realizes he can control his life, and he can get a better life. By the end of the book, it can be assumed that Ponyboy does. At one point in everyone’s life, they must face themselves and make life-changing
