A Separate Peace Literary Analysis

In 1959, John Knowles authored a novel named A Separate Peace. Knowles writes about a student, Gene, and his relations with his best friend, Finny, an athletic superstar. They had both attended a boarding school, named Devon, in 1942 the height of World War II. Throughout his novel, Knowles incorporates many themes. One of the themes in Knowles’ novel, A Separate Peace, is that when someone believes that s/he is engaged in a personal battle against, another person, s/he is not at peace. A visible instance where Gene believes he is in a battle against FInny is when Gene falsely perceives Finny is trying to sabotage him. Gene is a dedicated student who aims to be the school’s valedictorian. Finny, however, does not share this passion for school, and constantly pulls Gene away from his studies for activities such as club meetings. Robert Evans, a literary critic, describes Gene’s response, as he writes: “Gene even begins to think that Finny may actually want to distract Gene from his studies and thus prevent him from achieving his lofty academic ambitions.” Gene convinces himself that he was in a battle with Finny, leading to him jumping …show more content…
One of Finny’s notable traits was his love for noncompetitive competition in athletics. Unbeknownst to Finny, Gene feels very differently about the competitive nature of their friendship. Robert Evans describes Gene’s feeling “but he [Finny] cannot begin to comprehend just how deeply rooted and darkly motivated is Gene's own unique, perverse sense of competition.” Gene was always in a constant mental battle against Finny. At the end of the story, Gene comments “ ..I never developed an intense level of hatred for the enemy.. He [Finny] was indeed the enemy” (Knowles 204). Gene saw everything through the lens of a battle with Finny at Devon, and as a result was never at