Free Some of Tim's Stories by S. E. Hinton Page B

moment again, and I don’t want to capture that moment again. But I may write a sequel and put it in my safety-deposit box to be opened after my death, just to keep another writer from doing a sequel after the copyright expires. As much as I don’t mind
fanfiction.net
, I’m uncomfortable with the thought of somebody else seriously messing with my characters.
    Did the title of your second novel
, That Was Then, This Is Now,
become a personal statement—as well as a great name for your new story
?
    My subconscious works so well that, yes, it could be a personal statement, now that I look back on it. But at the time I wanted to use it as a metaphor for growing up and suddenly realizing you can’t go on being a little kid. You’ve got to make some tough decisions. Sometimes they’re not going to be the right decisions, but you’ve got to blunder your way through them.
    When we first visited, you said that you feel
That Was Then, This Is Now
is a better book technically than
The Outsiders.
Can you elaborate on what, in your opinion, makes it better technically
?
    Because I had a little more control of my emotions; some of
The Outsiders
is over the top emotionally. You’ve got to control emotion with technique. Talent plus discipline equals art; you can’t have one without the other.
    In reviewing
That Was Then, This Is Now,
the
New York Times
described it as mature, disciplined. What did you learn writing
The Outsiders
that made you more proficient when you were writing on
That Was Then, This Is Now?
    Going through revisions of
The Outsiders
, I learned not to be overly descriptive, but I’d been writing for many, many years and had been teaching myself the whole time.
    You were enrolled at the University of Tulsa when you were working on
That Was Then, This Is Now.
Did it seem strange to be sitting in a freshman comp class when you’d already made publishing history
?
    It certainly didn’t make it easier for me to get through freshman comp; that was a hard class.
    In what ways are Bryon and Mark, your lead characters in
That Was Then, This Is Now,
different from Ponyboy and his extended family of friends
?
    Oh, they’re very different. I try not to repeat my characters at all. When I wrote about Mark, I kept thinking of him as a lion on Bryon’s chain. And Bryon isn’t Ponyboy in that he isn’t as sensitive. He isn’t aware of society until it knocks him in the head. He can’t just sit and observe.
    Did you ever find yourself slipping into Ponyboy’s voice when you were writing as Bryon
?
    I’d left Ponyboy behind by that time, so I never had any trouble with Bryon’s voice.
    In
That Was Then, This Is Now
you do allude to Ponyboy from time to time. He’s become a local hero of sorts; your character Cathy wants to date him in the final chapters in the book. Did referencing him give you a sense of continuity as a writer
?
    It did in that I wanted to mark the time and place for
That Was Then, This Is Now
. It happened a few years after
The Outsiders
, so I have Ponyboy do a walk-through. Also, Bryon, especially in the beginning, didn’t like Ponyboy. He thought he was stuck up, thought he was vain because he was so good-looking. I wanted kids to see how easy it is to make wrong assumptions.
    I mentioned how much I admired your edgy description in
The Outsiders,
your ability to view your characters beyond stereotypes. In
That Was Then, This Is Now,
you demonstrate that same talent. When Bryon goes to visit Mark in the reformatory, he notes, “He had lost weight but somehow it had stretched his skin over his bones and slanted his eyes. He hadn’t lost his looks
but exchanged them.” How distinctly do you see characters in your writer’s eye
?
    I usually see my characters very, very distinctly. Sometimes I even dream about them. When I do, they’re not the actors; I see the characters. I guess that comes