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Comparison of Themes in The Outsiders and The Kite Runner

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For as long as people have had disagreements, there have been social classes divided by both ethnicity and wealth. The rigid social structure formed by these disparate groups often hurts the lower rungs of society, who many times end up disparaged by the rest of society. In S.E. Hinton's book, The Outsiders, the main character, Ponyboy Curtis, tries to combat the social separation between the Greasers, presented as poor gang members, and the Socs, depicted as rich and out of trouble. In the book Ponyboy, a Greaser, tries to escape murdering a Soc in self-defence. In Khaled Hosseini's novel, The Kite Runner, Hosseini illustrates the effect of the social and political strife on the country and its people through Amir, a rich Pashtun Sunni …show more content…

His blue eyes flicked to Hassan. "Afghanistan is the land of Pashtuns. It always has been, always will be. We are the true Afghans, the pure Afghans, not this Flat-Nose here. His people pollute our homeland, our watan. They dirty our blood." He made a sweeping, grandiose gesture with his hands. "Afghanistan for Pashtuns, I say. That's my vision (Hosseini 40)."

Within Hinton's novel, the Greasers are continually clashing with the Socs due to the Socs being rich. They consider the Greasers “low-brow” and then jump and generally look down on them. “Most of my friends at school come from good homes, not filthy-rich like the Socs, but middle-class, anyway (Hinton 163).”

Although the setting and the forms of the social partitions are depicted very differently in each novel, the eventual realization is made by the main character in both books end up being very similar. Ponyboy realizes that all the constant fighting made between the Socs and the Greasers ended being futile, only causing detriment to both the upper class Socs and the poor Greasers. “Johnny didn't even try to grin at him. ‘Useless... fighting's no good....’ He was awful white (Hinton 148).” Even though this is not Ponyboy but his close friend, Ponyboy later makes the same realization.

I would. I'd help her and Randy both, if I could. "Hey," I said suddenly, "can you see the sunset real good from the West Side?"

She blinked, startled, then smiled. "Real good."

“You can

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