The absence or presence of invidiousness has the potency to strengthen or dismember friendships. In John Knowles’ A Separate Peace, Gene Forrester and his daring roommate, Finny, discover the dangerous impact of enviousness on their friendship. Gene’s jealousy of Finny’s athletic capabilities, Finny’s unenviable thoughts and actions, and Brinker’s suspicions that Gene’s envy catalyzed Finny’s accident were all contributing factors to the ups and downs in Gene’s and Finny’s relationship. Detesting a friend for his/her successes can rupture even the strongest relationships. Gene’s invidiousness of Finny’s numerous sports achievements transforms into a resentful hatred. One day, when the boys are about to perform their daily ritual of …show more content…
When Finny jokingly says he was extremely envious of Gene one day, Gene bursts and unknowingly concludes that “all of [Finny’s] assertions of friendship were fake and [he] was only jealous of my success” (Knowles 34). Finny’s meaningless comment sparks Gene’s anger, invoking him to accuse Finny of befriending him only to bring him down. Gene’s sudden lash informs Finny of Gene’s distrust and jealousy of him. Similarly, Gene starts to feel a sense of betrayal from Finny, beginning to believe that Finny’s friendship is unreal. The argument, which is centered on Gene’s jealousy, slowly rips the boys away from one another, because of lack of trust in each other. Therefore, in this case, Gene’s envy tardily tore apart his relationship with Finny. However, the lack of invidiousness in a friendship fortifies the relationship even more. Repeatedly, throughout the book, Gene is astonished by Finny’s ability to be accepting of other’s successes, without exhibiting any envy or spite. As Gene’s past arguments with Finny display, Gene conceived that Finny was jealous of his academic success. On page 77, Gene’s ideas are disproven when Finny flaunts his admiration for Gene’s acquirement: “‘It [academics] seemed to come so naturally to you; I [Finny] never realized you had to study’” (Knowles 77). Finny’s words show his admiration for Gene’s drive to progress at what he
Essentially, Gene’s conflict begins as he develops feelings of envy towards Finny’s outgoing personality and appealing charisma, which causes him to hide behind a persona in the one-sided rivalry he has with Finny. When Gene flunks a test for the first time, he finds an excuse to justify his failure, concluding that Finny purposely interrupted his studies by inviting him to the beach. Gene reasons, “Sure, he wanted to share everything with me, especially his procession of D’s in every subject.
Gene made Finny his enemy, only because he felt envious of his personality and character. Knowles explains that all people should live life to its fullest, and avoid jealousy, envy, and hatred. A liberal humanistic review, shows that Knowles’ novel, promotes the enhancement of life.
As Gene feels the obligation to lose himself to become Finny, Knowles shows us that a loss of identity may be present in a relationship if there is an unequal amount of power. When Finny tells Gene that he has to play sports in the place of Finny himself, Gene says, “I lost part of myself to him then, and a soaring sense of freedom revealed that this must have been my purpose from the first: to become a part of Phineas” (77). Gene loses who he is to become the powerful Finny because told him to do so. He feels the need to give up his identity seeing that he has the order to do. This results in an unequal friendship because a true friend would never force someone to do something that would make them lose who they actually are. Gene and Finny’s unbalanced friendship eventually causes paranoia and insecurity on the less powerful side known as Gene because he is giving himself up.
Friendship is one of the most important relationships that people form in all of their lives. Children build bonds when they are young and use those skills to continue fulfilling friendships for the rest of their lives. Throughout A Separate Peace, John Knowles displays the good things about close friendships but also the hardships that often occur. Gene and Finny are two boys that attend Devon school. Which is a school that closely reflects the one that Knowles attended while he was growing up. Both Gene and Finny emotionally grow despite their opposite personalities, and they go through several situations that force them to consider the value of their friendship. Through their time at the school, Knowles reveals Gene’s and Finny’s
The first question to ask oneself is how Gene’s envy/imitations of his friend have affected him in any way? One such way is how he becomes more jealous over Finny’s athletic ability compared to his own.
Gene was attempting to be top of his class academically, but he was continuously being distracted by Finny. Oneday Gene decided to ask Finny if he would be upset if Gene was top of their class. Finny responded by saying, “‘I’d kill myself out of jealous envy’” (Knowles 52). Although Phineas said that in a joking manner, it is clearly that he really would be jealous if Gene was top of their class. Finny loved to be first, and he didn’t like when people threatened his position. After pondering on Finny’s comment, Gene realized, that he may have, “deliberately set out to wreck [his] studies” (Knowles 53). Finny clearly had extreme envy of Gene for better academically. It is unhealthy for friends to be jealous of each other, especially when taken to that extreme. Finny was being unsupportive and selfish, just so that he could be better than Gene.
“The tone of his words fell dead center, without a trace of friendliness or unfriendliness, not interested and not bored, not energetic and not languid” (Knowles 188). Gene and Finny were best friends and always talked to each other with excitement. Now that the truth came out, Finny shows no emotion at all to Gene. Gene’s habits have affected their friendship
As Knowles’ narrative progresses, Gene’s developing resentment of Finny’s seemingly abundant talent triggers an increasingly dark and misguided rivalry. After surmising his exemplary grades would even the score between the two boys, Gene commits himself academically. Consequently, he assigns blame to Finny for sabotaging his studies so
His ability to play sports with ease, his charm, and his overall perfection all go away. Gene now feels as though he does not have anything to be jealous of, which is what prompts him to commit this act in the first place. Being in a close friendship with Finny made Gene admire Finny’s terrific qualities, but unfortunately led him to jealousy as well. After Finny falls from the tree, Gene becomes conflicted with his own identity. As time goes on, Gene wants to be more and more like Finny.
Gene attempts to understand how Finny achieves harmony in his life, but his efforts only lead to personal self-destruction. Gene believes that Finny is trying to "become his equal…" (43) sparking the thought that anyone who would dare challenge his mind is an enemy. Gene's obsession with his scholar superiority eventually causes him to view all things less then him, including
First and foremost, Finny is a devoted friend because he is subservient towards Gene. When Gene spends the night at the beach with Finny, he returns the next morning just in time to take his exam. Of course, because he spent the entire night at the beach, he did not get enough time to study for his exam. Gene flunks the test, but Finny would not himself let Gene be upset over it. Finny engages all day long, “right after lunch there was a game of blitzball” (51). Later in the day, there was also a meeting of the “Super Suicide Society of the Summer Session”.
Someone once said “Humans, how tragically destructive we are.” As humans we all have our instincts, and these will subconsciously affect our daily decisions. Very seldom do we realize the decisions we make could change our lives forever in an instant, and it may come back and affect us later. A Separate Peace written by John Kolwes is thought to be about friendship but when looking at the two main character's true personality and motivation it can also show the true human nature of people. The story gives the ensite of Gene Forrester and showed how his natural thought process is what will bring his whole world tumbling down around him. These characters Gene and Phineas may be seen as complete opposites but truly they are extremely similar.
As Gene and Finny start to become closer, Gene begins to feel jealous, envious, and suspicious of Finny. Finny’s athleticism, friendly demeanor, and ability to escape trouble all strike Gene’s inner
Gene and Finny are the best of friends and spend all their time together. However, Gene is not a good friend to Finny. Gene lacks self confidence and is insecure about himself, which makes him jealous of and have hateful thoughts toward his "best friend", Finny (Nina B. 1). Gene is jealous of Finny because everyone loves him and he has the ability to talk his way out of any sticky situation he finds himself in. He is also jealous
(53) By characterizing Finny’s actions of “cold trickery”, “calculated”, “enmity”, and deliberate sabotaging, Gene clearly expresses his negative, paranoid view of Finny. The diction shows how evil Gene believes his best friend has become, demonstrating the imagined conflicts that can result from failure to form one’s own identity. This is ironic because Finny is in fact kind, and Finny soon shows that he is baffled by Gene’s idea of a