:S. E. Hinton

While still in her teens, Hinton became a household name{{efn|name=sensation}} as the author of The Outsiders, her first and most popular novel, set in Oklahoma in the 1960s. She began writing it in 1965. The book was inspired by two rival gangs at her school, Will Rogers High School, the Greasers and the Socs, and her desire to empathize with the Greasers by writing from their point of view.{{efn|"Someone should tell their side of the story, and maybe people would understand then and wouldn't be so quick to judge."}} She wrote the novel when she was 16 and it was published in 1967. Since then, the book has sold more than 14 million copies. In 2017, Viking Press stated the book sells over 500,000 copies a year.

Hinton's publisher suggested she use her initials instead of her feminine given names so that the first male book reviewers would not dismiss the novel because its author was female.{{efn|"Viking signed her ... with a suggestion that she call herself S.E. in print, so male critics wouldn't be turned off by a woman writer." –Italie}} After the success of The Outsiders, Hinton chose to continue writing and publishing using her initials because she did not want to lose what she had made famous{{efn|"I made the name famous. I'm not gonna lose it."}} and to allow her to keep her private and public lives separate.{{efn|"I like having a private name and a public name. It helps keep things straight."}}

In interviews, Hinton has said that she is a private person and an introvert who no longer does public appearances.{{cite news|first=Heather |last=Saucier|url=https://www.tulsaworld.com/archive/inside-an-outsider-noted-tulsa-author-prefers-family-life-to/article_bbec609a-3a52-56a5-86f4-f25cc12d734d.html |title=INSIDE AN OUTSIDER // Noted Tulsa Author Prefers Family Life To Limelight|website=Tulsa World|date= April 7, 1997}} She enjoys reading (Jane Austen, Mary Renault, and F. Scott Fitzgerald), taking classes at the local university, and horseback riding. Hinton also revealed to Vulture that she enjoys writing fan fiction.{{cite web|first=Emma|last= Whitford|url=http://www.vulture.com/2015/03/6-famous-authors-whove-written-fanfiction.html |title=Lev Grossman, S.E. Hinton, and Other Authors on the Freedom of Writing Fanfiction|website=Vulture|date= March 13, 2015}}

She resides in Tulsa, Oklahoma, with her husband David Inhofe, a software engineer she met in her freshman biology class at college. He is a cousin of former Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe.{{Cite web |last=Smith |first=Sue |title=Tulsans Have Novel Time at Premiere |url=https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/1982/07/30/tulsans-have-novel-time-at-premiere/62877194007/ |access-date=2023-10-25 |website=The Oklahoman |language=en-US}}

The film adaptations The Outsiders (March 1983) and Rumble Fish (October 1983) were both directed by Francis Ford Coppola; Hinton cowrote the script for Rumble Fish with Coppola. Also adapted to film were Tex (July 1982), directed by Tim Hunter, and That Was Then... This Is Now (November 1985), directed by Christopher Cain. Hinton herself acted as a location scout, and she had cameo roles in three of the four films. She plays a nurse in Dallas's hospital room in The Outsiders. In Tex, she is the typing teacher. She also appears as a sex worker propositioning Rusty James in Rumble Fish. In 2009, Hinton portrayed the school principal in The Legend of Billy Fail.{{IMDb title|1213634|Legend of Billy Fail}}.

Hinton received the inaugural 1988 Margaret A. Edwards Award{{efn|name=edwards1988}} from the American YA librarians, citing her first four YA novels, which had been published from 1967 to 1979 and adapted as films from 1982 to 1985. The annual{{efn|name=edwards1988}} award recognizes one author of books published in the U.S., and specified works "taken to heart by young adults over a period of years, providing an 'authentic voice that continues to illuminate their experiences and emotions, giving insight into their lives'." The librarians noted that in reading Hinton's novels "a young adult may explore the need for independence and simultaneously the need for loyalty and belonging, the need to care for others, and the need to be cared for by them."

In 1992, she was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa by the University of Tulsa,{{Cite web|url=http://www.orgs.utulsa.edu/phibetakappa/honorary.html|title = University of Tulsa Phi Beta Kappa}} and in 1998 she was inducted into the Oklahoma Writers Hall of Fame at the Oklahoma Center for Poets and Writers of Oklahoma State University–Tulsa."[https://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry.php?entry=HI013 HINTON, SUSAN ELOISE (1949– )]" Oklahoma Historical Society.

The five YA novels, her first books published, are Hinton's works most widely held in WorldCat libraries. All are set in Oklahoma, and take place within a shared universe.

• The Outsiders (1967)
• That Was Then, This Is Now (1971)
• Rumble Fish (1975)
• Tex (1979)
• Taming the Star Runner (1988)

• Big David, Little David, illustrated by Alan Daniel (1995), picture book
• The Puppy Sister, illustrated by Jacqueline Rogers (1995), chapter book

• Hawkes Harbor (2004), novel
• Some of Tim's Stories (2007), short stories

• Great Women Writers, Rita Dove, S.E. Hinton, and Maya Angelou (Princeton NJ: Hacienda Productions, 1999), DVD video — autobiographical accounts by the three authors

{{notelist |25em |notes=

{{efn|name=edwards1988 |1=

Before 1988 the ALA awards did not distinguish "children's" literature—the Newbery book award and Wilder career award—from that for "young adults". Hinton won the first biennial "Young Adult Services Division/School Library Journal Author Achievement Award", according to plan, but there were only two as it was renamed and made annual after 1990.

On the last point compare the 1988, 1990, and 1991 Edwards Award citations.

}}

}}

{{Reflist|25em |refs=

{{cite news|url=http://legacy.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20071003/news_1c03outsider.html |date=October 3, 2007 |title=40 years later Hinton's 'The Outsiders' still strikes a chord among the readers |first=Hillel|last=Italie |work=San Diego Union-Tribune|agency=Associated Press|url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170702154155/http://legacy.sandiegouniontribune.com/uniontrib/20071003/news_1c03outsider.html |archive-date=July 2, 2017 |access-date=June 13, 2019}}

{{cite web|url=http://www.nypress.com/staying-golden/ |title=Staying Golden |work=Unsigned review of Hawkes Harbor |publisher=New York Press |date=September 28, 2004 |access-date=March 25, 2010}}

{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/23/books/review/Peck-t.html |title=The Outsiders: 40 Years Later |first=Dale|last=Peck |date=September 23, 2007 |newspaper=The New York Times }}

{{cite web|url=https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/536555/the-outsiders-by-se-hinton|title=The Outsiders |publisher=Penguin Random House |access-date=November 18, 2019}}

{{cite web|first=Andrew |last=Pulver |url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/oct/30/featuresreviews.guardianreview15 |title=When you grow up, your heart dies: SE Hinton's The Outsiders (1983) |work=The Guardian |date=October 29, 2004 |access-date=March 25, 2010 }}

{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/07/movies/MoviesFeatures/07hint.html|title=An Interview With S. E. Hinton: An Outsider, Out of the Shadow |first=Dinitia|last=Smith |date=September 7, 2005 |work=The New York Times}}

[http://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n79-063871 "Hinton, S. E."]. WorldCat. Retrieved March 10, 2013.

{{cite web |title=Frequently Asked Questions |url=http://sehinton.com/misc/faq.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071013090947/http://sehinton.com/misc/faq.html |archive-date=October 13, 2007 |website=sehinton.com |access-date= January 28, 2015 }}

[http://www.ala.org/yalsa/booklistsawards/bookawards/margaretaedwards/maeprevious/previousmargaret "1988 Margaret A. Edwards Award Winner"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131006024423/http://www.ala.org/yalsa/booklistsawards/bookawards/margaretaedwards/maeprevious/1988awardwinner |date=October 6, 2013 }}. Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA). American Library Association (ALA).

  [http://www.ala.org/yalsa/edwards-award "Edwards Award"]. YALSA. ALA. Retrieved September 26, 2013.

}}

• [https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2007/05/hintonqanda200705 "Some of Hinton's Stories"], interview for Vanity Fair (May 14, 2007)
• [http://www.nypress.com/news/staying-golden-FINP1020040928309289985 "Staying Golden"] article in the New York Press (September 28, 2004)

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{{Portal|Children's literature}}

• {{official website |www.sehinton.com/ }}
• {{IMDb name|0386023|S.E. Hinton}}
• {{isfdb name|2450}}
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20100731105552/http://digital.library.okstate.edu/encyclopedia/entries/H/HI013.html "Hinton, Susan Eloise"] in the Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture
• [http://lccn.loc.gov/n79063871 S. E. Hinton] at Library of Congress Authorities — with 17 catalog records

{{S. E. Hinton}}

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Category:1948 births

Category:Living people

Category:20th-century American novelists

Category:21st-century American novelists

Category:American children's writers

Category:American women novelists

Category:American young adult novelists

Category:Margaret A. Edwards Award winners

Category:Writers from Tulsa, Oklahoma

Category:University of Tulsa alumni

Category:American women children's writers

Category:20th-century American women writers

Category:21st-century American women writers

Category:American women writers of young adult literature

Category:Novelists from Oklahoma

Category:Will Rogers High School alumni