The Outsiders — Chapter 6

About This Passage

This is one of the bravest moments in the whole book. Two boys who have been hiding from the police for almost a week — boys whose own parents (in Johnny's case) didn't even ask if he was okay — climb into a burning building to save a bunch of small children they have never met. Notice how Hinton slows down so the reader can hear what the boys hear: 'Then we all froze. Faintly, just faintly, you could hear someone yelling.' That word 'faintly' is so quiet that Hinton has to say it twice — and Hinton makes us listen the way the boys do. Notice the way the children are described: 'huddled in a corner,' 'four or five little kids,' 'screaming his head off.' Hinton is making the children feel small and the danger feel big. And then Johnny — Johnny who has been so quiet and scared the whole book — yells 'Shut up! We're goin' to get you out!' He has stopped being scared. He has become the brave one. The chapter is asking us to notice that real heroes do not always look like superheroes — sometimes a real hero is a tired, hungry, hiding boy who hears a child crying and runs in to help.

Narration Prompt

Tell Chapter 6 in your own words. Begin at the Dairy Queen, where Dally tells Pony and Johnny that Cherry is now spying for the greasers and that Tulsa has gone to all-out warfare. Then tell about Johnny's surprise decision: 'We're goin' back and turn ourselves in,' and his hopeful, sad question about whether his parents have asked about him (they haven't). Tell about Dally's strange, soft voice in the car as he warns Johnny, 'You get hardened in jail. I don't want that to happen to you.' Then come to the top of Jay Mountain and the church on fire — the picnic kids missing, the faint yelling from inside, Pony breaking the window with a rock and climbing in, Johnny right behind him, the cinders and embers falling, the four or five small children huddled in the corner, Johnny throwing them out the window one by one. Tell how Pony tells Johnny to get out, then hears Johnny scream as the timber falls, and how Dally clubs Pony on the back to put the flames out and carries him to the ambulance. End with Pony in the waiting room, Soda's bear hug, and Darry — strong, scary Darry — crying in the doorway. Pony realizes Darry loves him after all, runs to him, and the chapter ends with the sentence: 'I had taken the long way around, but I was finally home. To stay.'

Discussion Questions

1. What in the story shows you that Johnny had already decided to be brave even before the church caught fire? Look at the moment at the Dairy Queen when he says, 'We're goin' back and turn ourselves in.' How do you know turning himself in is also a brave thing, even though it doesn't sound like running into a burning building?
2. Pony and Johnny think they may have started the fire by dropping a cigarette. When the lady cries that some kids are still inside, Pony says only one thing in his head over and over: 'We started it. We started it. We started it!' What in the story makes you think Pony runs into the burning church partly because he feels responsible? How can you tell from his actions that taking the blame and running to fix something can be a kind of love?

+ 2 more questions in the complete study guide