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The Outsiders Censorship Essay

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LisaMarie Brayden
Professor Susan Cassidy
English 169
27 September 2015
Censorship Essay: The Outsiders
I chose to write about the challenged book The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton. Susan Eloise Hinton began writing this book when she was 15 years old and had it completed and published by the time she was 18 years old. The Outsiders was published in 1967 and followed the two rival gangs (The Greasers and the Socs) in the town of Tulsa, Oklahoma. During the 1960’s there were many social changes that divided many and ended in violence (Hinton 2). The publishers chose to publish the book using her initials to make The Outsiders more appealing to their male readers. When The Outsiders was published it was a very controversial book, and I believe it still is. S.E. Hinton wrote this book because she “mad about the social situation” that was going on in her very own high school, “where everyone got into their little groups and wouldn’t make friends outside it” (Salem). She witnessed a fight in her own school which triggered her to sit down and write a few pages a day as a way to deal and cope with her feelings towards these ongoing social issues and for people to have more compassion for the lower class teens such as the “Greasers” (Hinton). In 1986 South Milwaukee, Wisconsin challenged The Outsiders because they felt that the alcohol, drug abuse, and characters from broken homes. The book has been challenged by many different schools, libraries, and church groups. A school

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