For a project in class we were given the option to read one of a list of like five books. After I read it, I immediately went to my teacher asking her if I could argue the gay themes, which were apparent to me, at least. She replied no, with the simple reply that she didn't think there was enough evidence, but still I was too motivated to change my idea now. Originally she gave me a dirty look when I told her I ignored her wishes. But the note that she wrote at the end was very complementary.
Here's the essay:
Gene uses one word may times to describe his trip back to the school where he spent his teenage years, and that word is “fear”. While back at Devon School for Boys, his visits two places. The first is the ‘Far Commons,’ where he pauses to look at the stairs that would eventually bring the greatest emotional turmoil he’s ever experienced; the stairs that would inadvertently take the life of his childhood best friend. The second is the spot where he almost killed Phineas, the tree that branches out over the stream. The boys were roommates during their time at Devon, and the very best of friends. The boys spend a summer at Devon, to be prepared if they were called off to war, where they lose themselves in one another; which teaches Gene a lesson that will never be forgotten. The boy’s individual personalities, Gene’s sketchy jealousy that leads to his act of betrayal, and finally the aftermath of the disaster, all help the reader understand the grief and guilt that Gene has to live with for the rest of his life.
Phineas and Gene got along like two peas in a pod. Two very different peas that is. The narrator of the story, Gene, is an intelligent loner. Finny is athletic and charismatic. Both boys appreciate one another very much. Gene describes how lucky he is to have Finny as a best friend after they attend a tea with the headmaster of the school. “I laughed along with Finny, my best friend, and also unique, able to get away with anything at all. And not because he was a conniver either; I was sure of that. He got away with everything because of the extraordinary kind of person he was. It was quite a compliment to me, as a matter of fact, to have such a person choose me for his best friend,” (Knowles, 28-29). Phineas also makes a sweet gesture towards their friendship after he drags Gene to the beach, “The last words of Finny’s usual nighttime monologue were, ‘I hope you’re having a pretty good time here. I know I kind of dragged you away at the point of a gun, but after all you can’t come to shore with just anybody and you can’t come by yourself, and at this teen-aged period in life the proper person is your best pal.’ He hesitated and then added, ‘which is what you are,’ and there was silence on his dune,” (Knowles, 48). They played off of each other very well; Gene could make Finny study, where as Finny’s charm would get Gene to participate in more athletics, “When I jumped on top of him, my knees on his chest, he couldn’t ask for anything better,” (Knowles, 19) even if it was just to make Finny happy. They went out of their way to please one another and were definitely quite smitten with each other.
After the trip to the beach Gene starts to get even more serious about his studies. In conversation about the prospects of Gene being first in class, Finny tells him “I’d kill myself out of jealous envy,” (Knowles, 52) if he got the honor. Gene, knew he was being sarcastic, but can’t figure out what he meant by that. He realizes just how close the two of them have become. This makes Gene rethink his friendship with Phineas. Gene immerses himself in studies because he is determined that Finny is trying to sabotage him; “Finny’s was a den of lonely selfish ambition,” (Knowles, 56). “[He] was more and more certainly becoming the best student in the school; Phineas was without question the best athlete, so in that way we were even,” (Knowles, 55) Gene fees that by the two of them being even, Finny will give up on his plans to ruin Gene. Gene eventually realizes, “he had never been jealous of me for a second. Now I knew that there never was and never could have been any rivalry between us. I was not of the same quality as he,” (Knowles, 59). When Gene understands the silly mistake he made, he feels ashamed and even more putt off by Phineas than he was before. When they get to the tree that overlooks the stream Phineas offers that Gene and he jump off it together to symbolize their friendship. Finny goes up first and Gene, as he climbs the tree, shakes the branch that Finny is standing on, sending him crashing to the ground.
After the accident, while Phineas is in the hospital, Gene tries on some of Finny’s clothes. Gene’s reaction to himself in the clothes is a very interesting one. “I was Phineas, Phineas to the life. I even had his humorous expression in my face, his sharp optimistic awareness. I had no idea why this gave me such intense relief, but it seemed, standing there in Finny’s triumphant shirt, that I would never stumble through the confusions of my own character again,” (Knowles, 62). Trying on his clothes is an interesting sign; the emotion could either be pure jealousy or a gentle admiration. The relationship that they share points to the second.
The summer session ends, and the boys go home for a month. On the way back up to school, Gene stops and sees Phineas at his home in Boston. While he is there they talk about the incident on the tree. Phineas starts by saying that he had a feeling that Gene had something to do with him falling out of the tree, then apologies for thinking of him like that and says “Never accused a friend of a crime if you only have a feeling he did it,” (Knowles, 66). When Phineas finally comes back to school he gets on Gene’s case about what he has been doing around campus. Phineas states that due to the fact that he broke his leg in the accident and would not be able to play sports again, Gene would have to play for him. Gene had a “soaring sense of freedom revealed that this must have been my purpose from the first: to become part of Phineas,” (Knowles, 85).The connection between the two boys has taken a new turn, as Phineas is encouraging Gene to adopt some of his trademark qualities, giving the boys a sense of life before the accident. Finny would train Gene daily, they would get up early and Gene would do a big circle around a tree. The other boys at the school are suspicious of Gene and end up holding a trail of sorts. The truth is revealed to Phineas that Gene did in fact cause him to fall out of the tree. On crutches by that time, Phineas flees the room on the second floor of the Far Commons and ends up falling down the marble stairs. The same set of marble stairs that at the beginning of the book the adult Gene visits with fear.
Love can be defined as warm attachment, enthusiasm, or devotion. In the ways that Gene and Phineas’ emotions and personalities interlaced, they were very much in love with one another. The individual personalities, Gene’s senseless jealousy and how the boys get over the catastrophe help the reader understand the interesting emotions that Gene has. “I did not cry then or ever about Finny. I did not even cry when I stood watching him being lowered into his family’s strait-laced burial ground outside of Boston. I could not escape a feeling that this was my own funeral, and you do not cry in that case,” (Knowles, 194). Gene does not return to the spot of where he spent his time with Finny until fifteen years later, and he is still haunted by what he did to him.
and source of course:
Knowles, John. A Separate Peace. NY: Scribner, 1959.
Hello, I am doing an essay on the book A Separate Peace in my English class, and want to site your essay, and use some content. I was wondering if I could have your permission to use it.
By the way, good essay. (Email me, or send me a private message)
I agree with your teacher that there is little evidence that there was anything gay about the friendship described in a Separate Peace.
John Knowles graduated from Phillips Exeter Academy in 1945 and wrote A Separate Peace in 1955. He has admitted that much of the book was based on Exeter and the people he knew there.
My father was a freshman at Phillips Exeter in 1945 and his brother (my late Uncle) was a freshman in 1946. My Uncle never graduated from Exeter because he died there in his Senior year. He was Captain of the Exeter Swim Team and he banged his ankle on the edge of the pool during a racing kick turn and freakishly died a few days later when a blood clot passed through his heart.
While I don't know for certain, I've always felt that A Separate Peace was loosely based on my Uncle's death. Exeter is a very close knit community and it is very likely that Knowles was aware of my Uncle's death. When I attended Exeter in the 1970s, many professors, several of whom knew both my Uncle and John Knowles, nobody disputed this interpretation.
Exeter was an all boy's boarding school. It is not surprising that boys formed very close friendships. Not every friendship between two males has anything to do with homosexuality.