This volume traces the unique trajectory of The Outsiders, from
beloved book to beloved movie. Based on S.E. Hinton's landmark novel,
Coppola's film adaptation tells the story of the Greasers, a gang of
working-class boys yearning for security, love, and acceptance in a
world ruled by their rival gang, the rich Socs.
The Outsiders: Adolescent Tenderness and Staying Gold explores the
cultural impact of Hinton's book, the process by which Coppola made the
film, the film's melodramatic components, the marketing of the movie to
a young female audience, and the nostalgia industry that has emerged
around it in recent decades, thereby illuminating how The Outsiders
stands apart from other teen films of the 1980s. In its depiction of the
emotional rather than sexual lives of young men on film and its
recognition of the desires of teen girls as an audience, The Outsiders
distinguishes itself from the standard teen fare of the era. With
seriousness and sincerity, Coppola's film captures the essence of the
oft-repeated, timeless message of the story: 'Stay gold.' This volume
engages with a wide range of disciplinary approaches--film studies,
gender studies, and literary and cultural studies--in order to
distinguish The Outsiders as the significant contribution to youth
culture that it was in the early 1980s and continues to be in the
twenty-first century.
The book fills a gap in existing scholarship on youth culture and is
ideal for scholars, students, and teachers in youth cultures, young
adult literature, film studies, cultural studies, and gender studies.
