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Summary Of A Separate Peace By John Knowles

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In A Separate Peace by John Knowles, the narrator Gene, and his best friend Finny, go through ups and down of their relationship. The book starts during the summer session of the prestigious Devon school and ends during the winter session. We are able to see the lives that these boys have during, not only the war time of WWII but, also the different times of the year which affects their actions. They seem to turn off their adventurous, risk taking, rule breaking ways during the winter time, but during the summer they are very wild, and take advantage of the rules. J. Knowles, while trying to show how these boys live at the school in New England during the war time, is also able to tie in elements of setting through the antithesis of behavior …show more content…

When winter arrives the boys know it is time to step up their game and work hard. Some characters, such as Finny, don’t express this as easily as others, but the mindset is very different from the summer for everyone. Upon returning back to the winter session, the reader can see ”worn expressions and careless posture that they had never been away at all (Knowles 73)”. What this means is that everyone is more stressed and work heavy, while in the summer they are more free willed. The summer is no equivalent to the time of the winter, which is why the quote explains how “they had never been away at all (Knowles 73)”. By using the formal verbs to describe something very usual to the audience, the reader feels a mood of sympathetic …show more content…

After this, Gene seems to feel very responsible for this break. When Gene later learns that Finny will never be able to play sports again (one of the factors of what makes them “even”) the reader starts to see a merge of the two personalities. Gene begins to think that he is Phineas saying “I was Phineas, Phineas to life (Knowles 62)”. Instead of using connotative diction the author chooses to tell the reader directly how Gene feels about Finny. This quote comes directly after Gene is told that he can no longer visit Finny after his break. This shows that he

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Finny playfully criticizes Gene 's clothing and is grateful for the lack of cleaning service. Gene replies that it is not a big loss considering the war, and he is Finny 's bed for him. The next day, Brinker will explode, wondering if Gene is ready to recruit, when he sees Finny. He starts making a joke on Gene 's "plane" - to kill Finny and get the room to himself - but Gene interrupts him and tells Finny about Brinker 's proposal to sign up. Finny 's harmless reaction leads Gene to realize that Finny does not want him to leave.

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However, after the “incident” with Finny he had a different perspective of the river, which included a mixed feeling of guilt and fears. Gene had realized that he made a mistake and because of this mistake and shaken up feelings, his friendship went down the drain. Soon Gene also learns that friendship is all about trust and he broke that with his best friend, Finny. Even though their perspectives on friendship were completely different, they both realized that friendship is not all just about love but also needs a firm foundation of

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One evening before a french examination, Gene is in his room stufying, when Finny comes in and announces that they should go down to the tree to watch Leper jump. Gene believes that Phineas had planned the event to ruin his grade and passive aggressively confronts him about the situation. However when Finny reacts to this confrontation with nothing but honestly say that Gene should stay and study if he feels the need to, Gene begins to lose his reality of Phineas and does not understand much about his best friend any more. “ I was groping for what lay behind his words, for what his thoughts could possily be. I might have asked, “Who are you, then?”

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Gene becomes his most petty and vicious self. This is a battle for Finny and Gene because both of them battle with and come to learn their true identities. Gene realizes what he has done and feels terribly guilty. He is worried that Finny is going to realize that his fall was because of him. He is also worried that once Finny sees his face he will automatically accuse him.

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When Finny finds out that Gene is going to be the assistant manager for the crew team he questions it because he knows that Gene is good enough to play sports, especially since it’s his senior year

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Their relationship was affected due to FInny viewing Gene as a part of him. Knowles tells us, “ aid alone had never seemed to him in the category of help…Phineas had thought of me as an extension of himself” (Knowles 17). This shows that Phineas was close enough to Gene that any time Gene helped it was like his conscious. Gene envied Finny but later on in the novel we see the advancement of maturity in Gene. The relationship of Gene and Finny was affected by Gene conforming to Finny and Gene maturing.

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Instead of just following him he realizes, “ 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 part of Phineas”(p.85). After Finny came back from breaking his leg, Gene becomes putty in his hands. He does what he tells him. He cannot tell him no. Finny makes he do all sorts of childish shenanigans and he goes along with them.

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He is basically, through rhetorical questions, saying that he does not want to do what Finny does, but it’s like he cannot help it. This is affecting who Gene is as a person because he is not thinking for himself. Is Gene really even himself if Finny is doing the thinking for him? If he is not thinking for himself, he is not being true to himself. Another way that Gene is affected is that he allows his imitation of Finny get in the way of his schooling.

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He still encourages Gene to do the things that Finny no longer can because he wants to see someone else flourish, and most importantly: his friend. After Finny’s death, Gene even declares that “nothing … had broken [Finny’s] harmonious and natural unity” (Knowles 203). Since Gene exclaims this, the reader understands that Finny

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Gene comes of age through his understanding of the difficult challenges in his youth. Gene’s jealousy towards Finny’s perfect personality causes him to have childish emotions, such as resentment. Gene Forrester constantly battles within himself clashing emotions, specifically, hate and envy, towards Phineas. Since he strives to be like Finny, Gene does everything in his power to shove down his feelings of hatred and jealousy. After Finny beat the school swimming record, Gene suspiciously asks himself why Finny did not want him to share the news with anyone else.

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In the novel A Separate Peace, there are multiple themes running through the story. The theme that affected the plot of this story the most was coming of age. All throughout the story Gene is seen growing and maturing. He makes the transition from his childhood into his adult life. This is important because it shows how his attitude and actions are affected by growing up which in turn changes and molds the plot and overall resolve and resolution of the novel.

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Charles Kuralt once said, “ The love of family and the admirations of friends is much more important than wealth and privilege.” This quote shows how jealousy and popularity aren’t as important as relationships in your life. In the book, A Separate Peace, Gene has different priorities than relationships. Gene, a young boy who attends Devon boarding school, goes through many different trials along his grade school journey. He faces problems with friends and school life during the time of World War two and the draft being in full swing.

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A Separate Peace by John Knowles is a fictional book about Gene Forrester, a student at Devon Private Boarding School. This story takes place during the 1940s when World War II was becoming more and more a part of daily life at Devon. The war encroaches and finally dominates the lives of the boys at Devon. Starting with the boys shoveling snow off of the train tracks, then their friend, Leper, enlists, and finally troops get permanently stationed at Devon.

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