Analysis Of A Separate Peace By John Knowles

Since the beginning of time, humans have been plagued with conflict as they struggle to survive and make their places in the world, to help them live peaceably with each other, they have created laws and rules. Sometimes, their fears get the best of them; however. They become envious of each other and insecure about their own shortcomings. They sometimes make enemies of each other and wage war against them. John Knowles’s book, A Separate Peace, captures these themes of conflict. The novel effectively portrays the themes of insecurity, envy and war through the course of the story. envy, an ongoing theme throughout the story, is felt by the main character -throughout the story Gene feels a great deal of envy towards his friend and roommate, Finny. Gene is constantly envious of Finny, because Finny is a better athlete, charismatic and kinder than Gene. Gene starts to believe that Finny is trying to sabotage his grades. This deep rooted envy of Finny even drives Gene to Knowingly break Finny's leg. A good example of this is when Finny wears the school tie as a belt but does not get caught. “ He had gotten away with everything. I felt a sudden stab of disappointment.” (P28) A probable cause of all this envy is Gene’s insecurity. …show more content…
Gene often mentions how he is not as good as Finny at a plethora of social and physical activities. Despite resenting Finny for his superior skills at many things, Gene resents himself for not being as skilled in sports or as socially adept as Finny. As the story progresses, Gene internally rants about how he is better than Finny. “I was certainly becoming the best student in school; Phineas was without question the best athlete, so in that way we were even. But while he was a very poor student, I was a pretty good athlete, and when everything was thrown into the scales they would in the end definitely tilt towards me