Who wrote S. E. Hinton’s young-adult novel The Outsiders?

S. E. Hinton wrote the young-adult novel The Outsiders.

The Outsiders was Hinton’s first published novel and appeared in 1967, when she was still a teenager. The story follows Ponyboy Curtis, a teenager caught in conflict between the working-class Greasers and the wealthier Socs in an unnamed Oklahoma city.

Hinton used her initials on the book because her publisher believed a gender-neutral author name might help male readers take the story seriously. Her full name is Susan Eloise Hinton, but S. E. Hinton is the author name most closely associated with the novel.

The book is often identified as an important early work of modern young-adult fiction because it treats adolescent characters and social problems with unusual seriousness. Its film adaptation, directed by Francis Ford Coppola, was released in 1983.