John Knowles 's A Separate Peace

Gene Forrester, the main character in the novel A Separate Peace, by John Knowles, lived his teen years fearfully, and without peace. As he grew, he becomes mature, and attempts to find peace. By the end of the novel, Gene Forrester does attains “a separate peace” from guilt, find peace within himself, and obtains peace of mind.

Only gradually does he admit to the existence of war, in which Gene is unhesitant to follow in pursuit. This is because Gene regards Finny as a virtuous boy whom he has faith in and wishes to resemble. Fifteen years after the events of the war and the narrator still lives in the atmosphere which his deceased friend created for him. It is without question that Finny was the main contributor in altering the way Gene used to perceive conflicts in his life, and having such a profound influence on Gene, how he perceives them even 15 years later.

It wasn’t my neck, but my understanding which was menaced. He had never been jealous of me for a second. Now I knew that there never was and never could have been any rivalry between us. I was not of the same quality as he.” This is what Gene fears, more than Finny’s charm or athleticism but his goodness of heart, how what he says is what he means for his motives. What I don’t understand is why Gene is relieved of fear when Finny falls from the tree and breaks some bones in his body. His athleticism was destroyed, but his character wasn’t. Maybe it was because that’s one less thing Finny is able to do, but I’m not sure what to make of this. In addition to what I said in the first paragraph, when Brinker brings in Gene and Finny into the courtroom to investigate the accident, although Gene fears that the truth will be told, he’s not the only one there who holds the emotion of fear. “Finny turned toward me. “You were down at the bottom, weren’t you?” he asked not in the official courtroom tone he had used before, but in a friend’s voice.” Finny fears Gene’s betrayal that he has altered the past in his mind to avoid facing the truth. In the beginning of the investigation, Finny is unsure about what happened. First he claims that he took a wrong step and lost his balance. When Gene is the interrogated about whether he was in the tree or not, Finny aggressively said, “How do you expect him to remember?” “There was a

Gene’s envy and imitation of Finny affect him in many ways. Gene begins to lose his identity and start conforming to Finny. According to Knowles, “If I was head of the class and won that prize then we would be even…” (27). This quote explains how Gene follows finny by trying to be head of the class with him. Gene gets jealous of Finny being head of the class, so he tells him if he was head they would be even. When Finny introduce jumping off the tree to Gene at first he didn’t want to do it, but he wanted to be like Finny so he did it. In Knowles words, “what was I doing up here anyway? Why did I let Finny talk me into stupid things like this? Was he getting some kind of hold over me? (5).

War is a destructive force whose nature is to destroy all things and change lives forever. It is a whirlpool that sucks everything in and is fueled by hatred and violence. Whether one is directly involved in the battlefield or waiting to see the outcome, war has the capacity to affect all people. It can harden one beyond their years and force them to grow, seeing conflicting sides of good and evil. A Separate Peace by John Knowles narrates the story of young boys growing up with World War II as the backdrop. The war impacts them dramatically and is constantly thought about as they are coming of the age since they will soon be enlisted. However, not only are they living during an era of war but are also struggling with the war inside of themselves as they search for the truth within. Knowles depicts the ability of war to affect teenage boys in Devon, an English preparatory school, and transform them from carefree boys to troubled young men in search of their own separate peace.

Gene’s envy and intimidation of Finny caused great internal turmoil with himself throughout the story. He went through and identity crisis because he was unsure of who he was and who he wanted to be. In the story, Gene said, “I went along, as I always did, with any new invention of Finny’s” (Knowles 117). He always went along with everything Finny proposed or did; this gave him little to no time to discover who he really was. This lack of personal discovery lead him to doubt who he was. This internal conflict within Gene also affected his personal actions. Before Finny’s fall, Gene said, “I took a step toward him, and then my knees bent and I jounced the limb” (Knowles

A Separate Peace questions morals in friendships and how friendships survive through tough times. In the book, Gene and Finny have many disagreements, but most of them are between a character and the idea of the other character. They keep trying to make the best out of their situations, yet sometimes their

Many people want to grow up quickly, they wish to be on their own as soon as possible, but the process of growing up can be as challenging as climbing Mount Everest. In A Separate Peace, Gene Forrester, a teenage boys struggling with self-doubt, is a prime example of this. Year after year, people are met with inner turmoil on who they are and what they stand for, moreover, the transition between adolescent to adulthood only increases complications with identity.

In his novel A Separate Peace, John Knowles demonstrates that, to achieve adulthood, one must lose innocence and acknowledge this loss.

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.

“But I no longer needed this vivid false identity . . . I felt, a sense of my own real authority and worth, I had many new experiences and I was growing up “(156). Gene’s self-identity battle ends and he finds his real self. Gene’s developing maturity is also shown when he tells the truth about Leper. His growing resentment against having to mislead people helps Gene become a better person. When Brinker asks about Leper, Gene wants to lie and tell him he is fine but his resentment is stronger than him. Instead Gene comes out and tells the truth that Leper has gone crazy. By pushing Finny out of the tree, crippling him for life and watching him die; Gene kills a part of his own character, his essential purity. Throughout the whole novel Gene strives to be Finny, but by the end he forms a character of his own. Gene looks into his own heart and realizes the evil. “. . . it seemed clear that wars were not made by generations and their special stupidities, but that wars were made instead by something ignorant in the human heart” (201). He grasps that the creation of personal problems creates wars. Gene comes to acknowledge Finny’s uniqueness and his idealism and greatly admires his view of the world. He allows Finny’s influence to change him and eliminates the self-ignorance. At Finny’s funeral Gene feels that he buries a part of himself, his innocence. “I could not escape a feeling

When Brinker gets finny and Gene up in the middle of the night, Gene is shocked and alarmed to find out that he’s to attend a trial determining whether or not he was responsible for Finny’s fall. Gene experiences a myriad of emotions: bitterness at Brinker thinking himself as Justice; anxiety about what will happen when they find out that it was his fault; anger, fear. And it all draws to a boiling point when Finny leaves and falls again.

He tries to get Finny to forgive him for what’s really inside of him, and Finny easily forgives him because he too realizes and understands that Gene has no power over the evil impulse inside of him: “No, I don’t know how to show you, how can I show you Finny? Tell me how to show you. It was just some ignorance inside of me, some crazy thing inside of me, something blind, thats all it was” (191). Gene's last conversation with Finny puts across all of Gene’s hidden feelings about what he has done to Finny. As Gene expresses what he feels to Finny, he realizes the importance of their friendship. Gene's confession to Finny about his inner impulse and his vulnerability makes Finny forgive him, and in return, Gene can forgive himself. Gene yearns for Finny to forgive him so that Gene can more forward from the accident and stop worrying and feeling guilty about it. Gene's two earlier attempts to admit his guilt and impulse to Finny had failed. Gene's desire to be open and vulnerable about the subject lets him to be able to truly confess about his feelings. When Gene finally accepts what's inside of him and what happened at the tree that one day it brings back their friendship. Their restored friendship survives Finny’s death. Even as Gene grieves for Finny, he does not cry because he feels as though a piece of him is missing and dead along with

In the novel, “A Separate Peace” by John Knowles, the seasons develop actions and characters in the story. The story takes place at an all-boys boarding school in New Hampshire during World War II based off of the author’s previous experiences at a boarding school. The two main characters, Finny and Gene, experience character development alongside different seasons. In written works, seasons are commonly used to symbolically represent a change in the character’s personalities. The nature or setting of the story is used to specifically evolve Finny and Gene in seasons such as the summer, autumn, and winter. Each season change also generates an entirely different mood.

Finny's strong and solid character is again evident the night of the tree jumping in which he fell and broke his leg. Prior to the occurrence, Gene explodes when Finny automatically assumes Gene will be present at the Suicide Society tree "leap"(46). Finny's thinking that studies can just be abandoned at anytime infuriates Gene. Once Gene