Power/Submission

1. Brinker’s actions – Brinker likes to be in power whether it be serving on a committee or influencing his fellow students. He is a student politician. However, Brinker also follows no matter if they’re ineffective or inefficient. Though he has influence over students, he is doing what the Devon School wants. He is creating obedient followers of Devon and its rules, not himself.

2. Gene/Finny – In this friendship, Gene submits to Finny’s whims and Finny holds the power. Even when Gene would prefer to study, he chooses to follow Finny to the river. As well, Finny still holds power over Gene after breaking his leg and it is why Gene feels peace when Finny is gone.

3. The War – Each person’s view of the war depends on their perspective. For old men like Mr. Hadley, the war is an opportunity to create stories, achieve honor, and hold power. For boys like Finny, the war demands submission to new sets of rules.

4. The Jumping Tree – The jumping tree is a place where Finny can show-off and therefore spread his influence over the other boys, having them awe at his feats. However, the tree shows its own display of power when Finny falls. The tree becomes a place where boys are made into heroes among their peers and a place where they are defeated.

5. Leper’s Actions – Leper is laid back and lives in his own world. He enjoys nature and though he doesn’t deny the war’s existence he lives life as if it doesn’t exist, preferring to search for beaver dams while others contribute to the war effort. However, Leper eventually succumbs to the war, enlisting when he’s shown the prettier side of it. He had more power over his life than anyone but gave it up for the war.

“I did not know everything there was to know about myself, and knew that I did not know it.”

This sums up what every teenager feels and that includes the boys at Devon. At the school, the boys must create an identity for themselves. For Gene, he has trouble finding who he is and decides to attach himself to Finny, a confident athlete with a strong personality. But Finny has his own share of trouble. When he breaks his leg, everything he made for himself no longer matters. All the time he placed in sports is gone and he cannot even enlist in the war, a war he’d been preparing for throughout school. As for Gene, being wrapped up in Finny, he searches for his identity within Finny. Yet, when Finny is injured, Gene is lost once more in who he is. Everyone experiences this identity crisis, searching for who they are, and most of the boys at Devon center their search around the war. Leper enlists despite the war being against everything he’s known to be, quiet and laid back. As well, Brinker enlists into the Coast Guard, utilizing his political skills without being forced onto the front lines for certain death. Still, their positions are relatable as I know as a teenager it’s tough to create yourself with so many choices along the way that form you.

Without reading the book, the title A Separate Peace hints that there will be some form of peace that is isolated and unique from the rest of the world. This is achieved at the Devon School. Outside of the school, the war rages on, but within Devon the war seems fictional. The war is distant and though the boys have seen news reels that show fighting no one can imagine witnessing that fighting in person.

Focusing on Gene, his separate peace goes beyond the war. Gene invests himself in Phineas, an athletic rule-breaker. Though they seem opposites, Gene becomes an extension of Finny. As they’re friends, it seems strange that Gene hurts Finny, but when he does he feels relieved and peaceful. Gene sees Finny as his friend and enemy. As well, while Finny is gone recovering, Gene feels a peace fall over Devon and he tries on Finny’s clothes, feeling complete when he does. Once Finny returns, he seems to be defeated as if Gene has won a silent war over him. Gene takes on Finny’s desires and dreams as if they share one life.

Gene’s separate peace is achieved when Finny dies. The competitiveness Gene felt can be put to rest since it was as a part of himself died with Finny. His guilt also went with Finny and Gene can finally become his own person.

A major change in one of the main characters is when Finny breaks his leg from falling of the tree. The break affects him (obviously) physically. He’s no longer able to do sports which is the one area he excelled in. Finny enjoyed sports and created his own. He even idealized them, believing that you always won sports and never lost. Yet the break takes him away from it and he can only hope to walk again.

Still, the effects go beyond physical. Finny changes emotionally. It is a slow progression, as he prefers to live in a false reality, but eventually he accepts that Gene caused his accident. This is the point where Finny truly died. Had he survived the operation, he wouldn’t be able to trust after this betrayal.

These physical and emotional effects cause mental change in Finny as well. Knowing that he can no longer compete gives Finny a “dying” mentality. He takes on the role of a terminally-ill father or defeated animal, asking Gene to fulfill his dreams and in the process devour him. Possibly, he wants Gene to become him or better, a scholastic athlete. Indeed, the fall changes Finny for the rest of his life. Which isn’t long.

A Separate Peace is set in New England during World War II at the Devon School. The weather changes throughout the year and fits the mood of the students. The summer is warm much like the student’s attitude. They’re friendly and carefree. When the winter session begins, everything becomes rigid again. In this time period, everything is rationed and nothing is wasted. With it being in New England, the air is crisp and cool. Not humid or muggy. Nearby, there’s a beach, but it’s foggy in the morning unlike the preconceived image of a clear, orange sky.

The book couldn’t happen in quite the same way today since World War II has ended, but it’s entirely possible. The stress of war still continues for some families and it’s able to affect two boys. As well, boys today still get jealous of each other. Causing Finny to fall from the tree could realistically happen. Knowles wrote something that is believable. In fact, he could stick “based on a true story” on the cover and no one would probably question it. There are a few things that seem strange such as Leper’s sudden appearance back at Devon or Finny’s uncommon cause of death, but everything is in the realm of possibility.

1. “With the sensation that I was throwing my life away, I jumped into space. Some tips of branches snapped past me and then I crashed into the water. My legs hit the soft mud of the bottom, and immediately I was on the surface being congratulated. I felt fine.”

This reminds me of when I feared riding roller coasters. I always felt tense riding one and each time I rode one unwillingly, I didn’t enjoy it, because it was forced. But the one time I chose to ride a roller coaster, I loved it. I felt that same sensation of flying and then the coaster stopped and I knew I was okay. There was nothing to fear and I continue to enjoy riding roller coasters.

2. “We were the best of friends at that moment.”

This reminds me of people I met when I was younger. I would play with them all the time at daycare or preschool and then one day I just never saw them again. It seems strange to meet people who you think are your best friends for ever. But they’re only you’re best friend at that moment in life.

3. “Phineas was very happy; sour and stern Mr. Patch-Withers had been given a good laugh for once, and he had done it!”

I can relate to this, because I enjoy making people laugh especially those who don’t laugh often. I don’t make people laugh to charm myself out of trouble, but I just enjoy brightening people’s day. Most of the time, I make them laugh unintentionally.

4. “Exposing a sincere emotion nakedly like that at the Devon School was the next thing to suicide. I should have told him then that he was my best friend also and rounded off what he had said. I started to; I nearly did. But something held me back.”

I think this highlights people today. Perhaps, it’s been a part of every society. People are too afraid to express their emotions. There are rare people, like Finny, who share their feelings and I admire them. I can’t stand to think that people bottle their feelings, their true feelings, because they think others will give them a hard time for it.

5. “The next morning I saw dawn for the first time. It began not as the gorgeous fanfare over the ocean I had expected, but as a strange gray thing, like sunshine seen through burlap.”

This quote reminds me how I often idealize things in my head and picture how they look only to find in reality that the image isn’t as glamorous. Mostly this happens when I make a picture in my head to draw, but when I draw it, it doesn’t resemble the image in my head.

6. “It struck me then that I was injuring him again. It occurred to me that this could be an even deeper injury than what I had done before.”

Gene is talking about when he tells Finny that he caused the accident. I can relate to this, because often I wonder if I should have told someone the truth. Sometimes the truth hurts people and you wish you hadn’t told them. You wish you could go back to living in blissful ignorance.

7. “I thought the issue was settled until at the end he said, ‘Listen pal, if I can’t play sports, you’re going to play them for me,’ and 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.”

I can relate to doing something for someone. That is, doing something for them because they wish they had. You do it in their honor. But I’d never think to “become” that person as Gene does. I enjoy this quote because it’s bittersweet: Gene realizes his purpose in life, but it’s not his own.

8. “If you want to be in a really functional room you ought to spend time in the bathroom then.”

This is one of my favorite statements, because it’s true: the bathroom is very functional room. Work gets done in the bathroom. In fact, I enjoy those moments I come out of the bathroom feeling fresh as if I switched into a new body. I imagine it’s the same feeling my Energizer Rechargeable batteries have when I place them in the charger.

9. “It’s all Japanese to me.”

This statement captures how much the war has affected people in Gene’s generation. Popular phrases are twisted to fit the time they live in. Of course, this one is Gene’s spin on “It’s all Greek to me.” The war has invaded every part of life.

10. “I knew that part of friendship consisted in accepting a friend’s shortcomings, which sometimes included his parents.”

I can relate to Gene completely on this one. I can’t stand hanging out with people who have crazy parents. But we’re friends so I can get over their parents. Unless their parents don’t ever let them out of the house and I never see them. That would be the only deal-breaker.