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External Conflict In John Knowles A Separate Peace

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Internal vs External Conflict in A Separate Peace
Friends don’t just jostle friends out of tall trees, but in A Separate Peace by John Knowles the main character, Gene, does just that. This is a consequence of Gene repressing the feelings of hatred and envy that he had towards his pal Phineas. The novel takes place during the Second World War and revolves around the life of Gene and his friends. The young men are seventeen years old and are soon expected to go off and fight in the war. At the end of the novel, Gene said “ I never developed an intense hatred for the enemy...I was on active duty all my time at school; I killed my enemy there.” (Knowles, 204). In his book, John Knowles builds up that Gene’s enemy is his habit of repressing internal …show more content…

His retelling starts out innocently enough, with a group of adolescents goofing around in the summer before they have to go off to war. However, as the story transitions into the winter months, the reader soon begins to see that Gene is developing new feelings regarding his friend Phineas. Phineas is a popular, athletic, well liked student with an ability to get away with almost anything he wants, and is very unlike Gene, who is reserved, studious, and often blends into the background, and these differences will contribute to the rift between these friends. Gene admits he is in fact jealous of Phineas after Phineas pulls a particularly impressive stunt that involved wearing a pink shirt out in public, saying “I was beginning to see that Phineas could get away with anything. I couldn't help envying him a little, which was perfectly normal. There was no harm in envying even your best friend a little” (Knowles 18). Gene does not pay much attention to his envy, not able to believe that this envy of his friend will lead to any conflict at this time, but not long after this realization does he begin to fabricate a rivalry between Phineas and

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Gene Forrester is very smart and is competitive with his friends. He becomes very jealous of his friend and roommate, Finny. Gene isn't very popular and wishes he could be as popular and well liked as Finny. This jealousy leads him to do harmful things and leads to the climax. Gene feels now he can take Finny's place.

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A Separate Peace Theme Jealousy In the novel, A Separate Peace by John Knowles, Knowles portrays jealousy as an element of friendship. The protagonist Gene Forrester has an ongoing battle within himself to find his true emotions towards Phineas, his best friend, and also to find his own identity. Gene and Phineas formed an illusion of a friendship, but there was always an internal rivalry going on between them in Gene’s mind. In the beginning Gene thinks " This time he wasn't going to get away with it.

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Soon thereafter, the two embark on a routine climb up the tree, which is so coveted, and Gene jounces the limb from underneath Finny, causing him to fall, and promptly afterward leaping with a previously unknown confidence (28). Gene jumps with a sudden confidence due to his knowledge that he had finally trumped Finny, by forcibly disabling the superior characteristic that he himself did not possess, Finny’s athleticism, therefore emerging from this imaginative rivalry on top. This is an example of the darker side of rivalry, resulting in growth nonetheless, of Gene’s confidence and an unconscious embrace of the mistresses of greed and pride. After the fact, Gene comes to terms that he was not battling Finny, but rather himself and his ignorant heart, sabotaging Finny being the confirmation. He goes further into his epiphany saying, “wars were not made by generations and their special stupidities, but that wars were made instead by something ignorant in the human heart” (109).

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On the other hand, Finny is a tremendous athlete, outgoing, and an average scholar. It seems as though their life is peaceful at the Devon School despite the war going on. However, Gene struggled internally to find peace with himself. In the novel, he says” my war ended before I even put on a uniform; I was on active duty all my time at school; I killed my enemy there” (Knowles 204) The reason Gene said that he killed his enemy at the Devon School because he was his enemy.

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Like a raindrop can foretell a storm, any object, action, or event can have a deeper meaning. A Separate Peace tells the story of boys at a boarding school under the backdrop of World War Two. John Knowles, the author, uses descriptive language to give power to the troubles that Gene, Phineas, and their classmates/friends go through, whether it be the effects of war, identity struggles, or friendship. The main conflict, Gene’s love/hate relationship with Phineas, ends with Phineas’s accidental death and Gene’s newfound mature awareness. John Knowles uses symbolism in many instances to strengthen his storytelling.

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A Separate Peace, Written by John Knowles tells the fictional story of a young man by the name of Gene. Throughout the novel, World War Two plays a very interesting role in the life of the main character. In the beginning the war has almost little to no importance to the characters of this book, however as the novel progresses the importance of the war envelopes the characters; when comparing the start to then end it can bee seen how the war slowly but surely dominates their lives. At the start of the novel, WWll is mentioned very rarely, and is of little importance to the characters. For example: The tree Finny breaks his leg on is mentioned to be used for military training, however this means very little to them.

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A War of Self In his novel, A Separate Peace, Knowles uses the story of Gene Forrester to examine a dark aspect of human nature. Gene Forrester, the novel’s protagonist, fights an inner battle of jealousy and hatred towards his best friend, Phineas. Phineas, an athlete, charismatic charmer, and fearless boy is someone that Gene wishes he could be. Gene creates an enemy out of Phineas in his mind because of the “competition” that is their friendship.

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Beware of Desires “Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else 's opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation,” observed Oscar Wilde. In the fictional novel, A Separate Peace by John Knowles two best friends, Gene and Finny, both go to an elite boys ' private school in New Hampshire. Finny is a natural born leader and an athlete that easily succeeds in everything he does. Meanwhile, Gene is a bookworm that tries his best to be as successful as Finny.

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Ralph Waldo Emerson once said that, “envy is ignorance; imitation is suicide.” (370). John Knowles’ A Separate Peace is set during World War I at Devon School, a boarding school for boys. The book centers on Gene Forrester, a student at Devon, who could be described as an intelligent, but jealous, conformist. A Separate Peace illustrates Gene’s envy and imitation of his friend, Finny, and how it affects himself and his relationship with Finny, and also how Gene eventually finds peace.

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On page 204 Knowles writes, “I never killed anybody and I never developed an intense level of hatred for the enemy. Because my war ended before I ever put on a uniform; I was on active duty all my time at school; I killed my enemy there.” The “enemy” that Gene was referring to in the second part of the sentence was his negative emotions and paranoia. This quote is directly telling us that Gene’s emotional turmoil and mental disturbances were resolved. Not only does John Knowles blatantly tell us that Gene found peace, he also implies it.

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In Gene's younger days, he is carefree and thinks only of himself. Maturity becomes more prominent when Gene confesses his evil against Finny. By the end of the novel, Gene overcomes the battle of good vs evil within and observes, "... my war ended before I ever put on a uniform; I was on active duty all my time at school; I killed my enemy there." (A Separate Peace, 110).

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In John Knowles’ novel, A Separate Peace, the main character, Gene Forrester, undergoes a traumatic journey to develop the aspects necessary for coping through adulthood. This novel is a flashback to the year of 1942, when Gene attends his final year at Devon High School, in New Hampshire. Although Gene appears to be Finny’s best friend, he follows in Finny’s steps so that his personality clones to be like Finny’s. Finny exposes new experiences that provoke Gene’s development into adulthood. As Gene engages in new experiences, he soon realizes that he envies Finny’s abilities.

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War: Its Effects, and Disguises Every person can be a veteran of war at times, even if it is in personal battles rather than literal war. This is the case for the Gene as well as Finny in John Knowles 's A Separate Peace. The significance of the contrast of internal conflict with external conflict highlights Gene 's multiple conflicts with himself as well as Finny, building internal and external conflict through both characters. Ultimately, Gene becomes a veteran in the literal and figurative sense of war, regardless of uniform. Gene 's victory in this war with himself portrays how war can prevail in and out of uniform.

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Their Amity is showed in this quote exhibiting who they are as people and what they genuinely mean to each other. They are not just best friends; they are dependent on one another. Genes’ obsession toward Phineas causes him to become more dependent on him throughout the novel and without Phineas, Gene is a more vigorous

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