Don’t let the tragedies of life corrupt you. Their youth will fade, along with their innocence, which gets increasingly tarnished by sin.īefore he dies, Johnny urges Ponyboy to “stay gold.” Remain innocent. “Nothing gold can stay.” Spring’s leaves fall in autumn. The boys are divided by socioeconomic status-blue-collar “greasers” verses upper-class “socials.” Much of the story takes place in a rundown, abandoned church where Johnny and Ponyboy hide from authorities after a fight ends when a “social” is stabbed to death.ĭuring their exile, Ponyboy reads to Johnny from Robert Frost’s “Nothing Gold Can Stay”:įrost’s poem gets them thinking. The Outsiders is a story of friendship, loyalty, and struggle. He has a simple parting message for his dear friend, Ponyboy: “Stay gold.” Hinton, young Johnny Cade lies dying from severe burns he received after saving a group of school children from a fire. They all disappear, and hence, nothing gold can stay.In one of my favorite books, The Outsiders by S.E. The use of the word ‘nothing’ summarizes all that he told in the poem – the golden of the leaves, the dawn, and the Garden of Eden.
#Stay gold meaning full#
The last line brings us full circle back to the title of the poem.
#Stay gold meaning series#
We also see another instance of alliteration with the series of D-sounds. The eating of the forbidden fruit was voluntary, but the dawn going down to the day is due to forces out of our control. This also gives us a sense of inevitability.
When the dawn goes down to the day, the leaves change from golden to green. It is this very dawn which gives the golden hue to the leaves as well. He considers dawn as much more beautiful and scenic, but it eventually goes down to become a normal day. Here he says that the beauty of the dawn goes down to the day.
Similarly, the golden leaf ‘sinks’ into the normal green leaf. The mere act of eating the forbidden fruit transformed the promise of a beautiful life in the Garden of Eden into the grief that we face today because we lost the opportunity to lead such a life. The poet makes a comparison here to the Garden of Eden. It transformed from something special to something ordinary. When the Forbidden Fruit was eaten, all the charm and the beauty of the Garden of Eden had reduced. Here, he makes a biblical reference – that to the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve first lived. ‘Hour’ rhymes with ‘flower’ and hence it’s the end of another couplet.Īlso Read: Summary of Birches by Robert Frost The gold stays for a small amount of time, and then quickly disappears from the leaves so that they can turn green. Here the hour doesn’t denote exactly an hour it stands for a very small amount of time. The poet says that it stays for ‘only so an hour’. Since the gold of the leaves is its hardest hue to hold, it disappears quickly. Here, the poet builds on what he wrote in line two. We also see recurrence of the personification of nature. Since we all know that leaves don’t quite develop to become flowers, we know that this is the use of a metaphor, where the flower is the metaphor for something beautiful. He compares that to a flower which is much more beautiful as compared to a leaf. The early leaf is the golden leaf that has been mentioned in the first line. The poet signifies the beauty of the ‘early leaf’ as a flower. Here, the poet further builds on what he mentioned in the first line. Also Read: The Death of the Hired Man: Analysis, Theme, and Literary Devices: 2022
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