At the start of the book I believed Gene was a good person, yet towards the middle, I wasn’t sure if Gene had the right intentions. I realized that although Gene had a great feeling of guilt for what he had done, he would never admit to people that it was he who broke Phineas and his future. When looking at the deeper meaning of the book “A Separate Peace,” I began to formulate the question “Would Gene have told Phineas or others that he was the reason for Phineas’ shattered leg, or would he have never said anything?” I began debating this question in chapter 8 when the truth was coming out and people were beginning to conclude what had happened to Phineas. Furthermore, the book contains many pieces of figurative language as shown on page 12 when stating, “Someday the Dean would probably live entirely encased in a house of glass and be as happy as a sandpiper” (Knowles.) This metaphor helped me to have a visual of how the school looked like during wartime, as that was the books setting. Therefore, the injury was not fully Gene’s fault.

On the other hand, the boys were not supposed to be on the tree anyway, and this adventure was Phineas’ idea. It took me a moment to realize that Gene may not have understood what he was doing, and most likely was not aware that Phineas would end up shattering his leg. This part of the book caused me to feel both surprised at Gene and confused about why Gene would do such a thing to his best friend. This resulted in Phineas tumbling into the water at uncontrollable speeds and never being able to play sports again. One day, Gene lashed out and shook a branch of a tree that Phineas was standing on. Gene, being best friends with one of the most popular and well-liked students Phineas, found it hard to contain his jealousy. I was very surprised by the main character Gene and his outlook on life. ‘A Separate Peace,’ has many twists and turns that result in interesting reactions from readers of vast age differences. The main character Gene goes through a period where his jealousy of his best friend drives Gene to do things he never thought he would be doing. Although this book would not be a book of my choice I did enjoy reading it for the interestingly developed plot, and intriguing characters that deal with real-life problems.

This summer all incoming freshmen were asked to read the book “A Separate Peace,” by John Knowles.

A separate peace by john knowles