Theme Of Innocence In A Separate Peace

Is innocence the price paid for knowledge and experience? In the novel A Separate Peace by John Knowles, characters that undergo a loss of innocence, such as Gene and Leper, lose said innocence through experiences of war and conflict. On the other hand, Finny retains his innocence throughout the novel, but does not experience or even acknowledge the existence of such conflict. Through the entirety of the novel, there are prominent changes in the states of innocence within each of the characters, reflected through a variety of components such as differing rivers, seasons, and changes in conflicts. Finny and Gene’s friendship changes because of changing states of innocence within Gene and also Phineas’ constant state of innocence. This ultimately

Gene mentions that “It seemed appropriate that my baptism [into the Naguamsett] had taken place on the first day of this winter session” (Knowles 86). Gene’s “baptism” demonstrates his complete immersion into this world filled with conflict and a lack of innocence, just as baptism in religion is a complete immersion into water to represent a dedication into a new world. The bitterness of the new world is illustrated through Gene’s description of the Naguamsett: “I had taken a shower to wash off the sticky salt of the Naguamsett River–going into the Devon was like taking a refreshing shower itself” (Knowles 86). In “A Separate Peace: The Fall from Innocence” by James Ellis, he explains “Gene has gone from the innocence exemplified in the Devon River to the experience of the Naguamsett.” A contrast is clearly established between the two rivers. While there was “nothing like the fresh-water Devon … where we’d had so much fun, all the summer,” the Naguamsett was described as “ugly, saline, fringed with marsh, mud and seaweed” and was “governed by unimaginable factors” (Knowles 76). The Devon river is described as “refreshing” and pleasant, the Naguamsett is something to “wash off.” Again,

“Gene’s symbolic fall comes when he gives in to ‘some ignorance inside’ and shakes the limb on which he and Finny stand” (Hamm). Gene’s shaking of the limb resulted “out of a sudden awareness that Finny was not jealous of him, was not competing” and “[his understanding of] his inferiority to Phineas and his own moral ugliness” (Holborn, Ellis). Gene’s fall from innocence is exhibited by the shaking of the limb on which Finny and him stood because it is not only the moment that Gene gives into his jealousy and envy towards Finny, but also his reaction to the manner in which Finny’s goodness sheds light on Gene’s distrustfulness and Gene’s realization that he “is not capable of maintaining the spiritual purity that distinguishes Phineas and so must as he discovers his own savagery betray Phineas” (Holborn, Ellis). This new knowledge that Gene now holds is detrimental to his innocence, as it sparks a malicious intent within Gene to become better than Finny and creates a one sided competition within Gene that can never be won until he accepts the unfairness of the world outside the idyllic summer of 1942. It