Henry F. Phillips

A friendship, defined by a positive emotional connection between two individuals, can only be fulfilled if a mutual commitment by both parties is made. The novel, A Separate Peace, by John Knowles, explores the conflict between two young men in a coming of age story. The main characters, Gene and Phineas, also known as Finny, are best friends at Devon Academy. The novel follows them on their struggle to find out who they are and what motivates them in a time of uncertainty and fear. Gene and…

Denial of Reality in a Separate Peace One large recurring theme in John Knowles’ A Separate Peace is the idea that refusing to confront reality causes people to suffer. With World War II as the backdrop for the novel, A Separate Peace pushes this ideology through a once innocent group of boys at a boarding school.In the novel, there are three dynmaic chracters: Gene Forrester, Elwin (Leper) Lepellier, and Phineas. Gene ends up accepting the realities of war, and grows and develops because of it…

A Separate Peace Essay Prompt: Discuss how the setting of the novel helps reveal the character of Finny or the narrator. A Separate Peace by John Knowles is a realistic fiction. The novel takes place at the school of Devon during World War II. It follows two boys, Finny and Gene, as their friendship rises and falls and how it shapes them into the people they are. It shows how they change as people and the struggle of growing up. Gene’s own feelings and actions impact the way the story goes and…

John Knowles’s novel, A Separate Peace, takes place in Devon Prep school in New Hampshire, at the beginning of WWII. A student there, Gene, accidently causes a tragic incident that involves his best friend, Finny. After the accident, Gene is unable to accept the truth, and hides behind Finny’s ignorance of the details of the event in hopes of continuing the peace between them. Through an unstable peace, Knowles displays that denying the truth can only lead to a precarious false sense of comfort.…

Friendship is one of the most important relation that people form in all of their lives. Young children’s tend to fulfill friendships with trust for the rest of their lives. But, sometimes even strong relation can end up like war, between two individual that might risk one’s life. John Knowles best known work “A Separate Peace” is one of the most popular youth and war novel. The novel focuses on two best friends Finny and Gene and their relationship during the time of World War II, a time of…

“ When you love something it loves you back in whatever way it has to love” (Knowles, pg. 111). The novel A Separate Peace focuses on the special bond between the two main characters, Gene and Phineas. Although these two have little in common, they stick together and often obsess over one another. This leads the reader to believe that there are ulterior motives in relation to their close friendship. The relationship between Gene and Phineas is one more than normal friendship because of the…

In the novel A separate Peace by John Knowles, Gene and Finny avoid the harsh realities of life. In the novel, Gene denies that he hurt his best friend, Finny. Finny denies that there is a war to create a fantasy world. Also Finny denies that Gene intentionally tried to hurt him. Gene and finny avoid the harsh realities of life in many ways. As we know Gene and Finny avoids the harsh realities of life. Gene does not accept the truth of him hurting Phineas. In the text, it states that ‘“then…

The idea of a partial person is not a new thing, nor is it a literary device that belongs solely to a singular author or genre. A person that suffers from physical, mental or spiritual un-wholeness usually serves an important role in the plot. An un-wholeness creates interest as it has a story; blank canvas often says more than a damaged one. Literature uses the idea of partiality just as any other art form does. Dickens’ pulls on heart strings in A Christmas Carol with the crippled Tiny Tim,…

Foreshadowing in Owen Meany (612-617) A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving gifts us with the story of Owen Meany, a small, miraculous boy with a big mission. Owen Meany knows that he is ‘god’s instrument’. He later finds out, in a dream, when he is going to die, how he is going to die, and he is going to die a hero. The story offers a great deal of foreshadowing. The main idea that has foreshadowing are things being ‘armless’. Some of these items that are armless include: Owen, the…

Literary Analysis of A Separate Peace What do you think the most and the most meaningful theme or themes for you? In this book—A Separate Peace—it talks a lot about friendship between Finny and Gene, who are the main characters and have diverse personalities for each of them in the book. However, even though they have different personalities, they maintained a very positive friendship, which didn’t long too. Later in the book, they have some conflicts that lead to their end because one of the…