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Summary Of John Knowles A Separate Peace: Competition

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In the natural world spiders are often one of the most feared creatures. Humans perceive that spiders will harm them but in reality spiders are solely concerned with themselves. Humans frequently have perceived emotions without any logical reason. This concept is made evident in John Knowles’ novel, A Separate Peace, with regard to competition. Competition is created in the mind of Gene between himself and Phineas, without any logical reason. Gene develops an increasing envy of Phineas’ athletic abilities and talkativeness that breeds competition. This competition is created by Gene noting the differences between Finny and himself changing Phineas’ personality to make him a competitor. The imaginary competition ends when Gene realizes his perceptions …show more content…

While at Devon school during the summer a group of boys had gathered beneath a tree that seniors jumped out of into the river. Phineas, at this time, had come up with the idea to jump out of the tree and is not even slightly daunted by the thought. Gene finds the idea to be crazy and irrational, however Phineas finds it to be a fun idea, “He of course saw nothing the slightest bit intimidating about it. He wouldn’t or wouldn’t admit it if he did. Not Phineas.” p6. In this situation the differences between Gene and Finny can be clearly seen. Finny is fearless in the face of danger and fully believes in his capabilities and has others fully believe in them as well as he is able to project confidence even if he is afraid. Gene, on the other hand, is extremely nervous at the thought of jumping from the tree. Instead of leading a situation and inspiring others, Gene climbs the tree and jumps only because he was told to, despite the fact that he is completely unsure of himself. Later on in the novel Phineas and Gene are in their dorm room. Phineas, who decides he wants to …show more content…

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?” instead. I was facing a total stranger.” p50. By thinking this it can be seen that Gene has become completely unsure of a person he htoughts he knew inside and out. Having the illusion he had about Phineas ripped away suddenly, has left Gene floundering in confusion about his new situation and himself. After Gere comes to this revalation he agrees to go down to the tree and attend the meeting. As the boys are walking down to the tree Gene’s mind is in a state of confusion over his situation and he is despratly trying to understand this new Phineas that he is seeing. Gene comes to the conlcusion that, “[Phineas] had never been

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He doesn't want to accept that he is not as outgoing or athletic as Finny. Gene can't accept that he is not a gifted athlete like Finny. Instead, he tries hard and without success to become everything that Finny is. A great example of this is when Finny jumps out of the tree into the river and Gene, who is scared to jump, jumps anyways because he wants to be like Finny. Gene takes chances and risks that he would otherwise not have just to be like Finny.

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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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It is this realization that prompts his conscious shaking of the tree, which casts Phineas to the earth and which serves as Gene’s initiation into the ignorance and moral blackness of the human heart” (Ellis 82). On a level of purity and innocence, Finny outweighs Gene by a lot, and it was Gene’s realization of his jealousy and his inferiority to Finny that led to the injury. This symbol of loss of innocence continues to come back and haunt both Gene and Finny throughout the novel. They both continue to grow and mature, but now it is different. Even though he never says anything about it until later in the novel, Finny knows that Gene purposefully shook the branch that caused him to fall and injure him.

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