A Seperate Peace
In the novel "A Separate Peace," by John Knowles, a man named Gene visits his high school 15 years after graduating in an attempt to find an inner peace with himself. While attending Devon, his high school, during World War Two, Gene's roommate and best friend Phineas died partially because of an accident involving Gene. Phineas, otherwise known as Finny, was one of the more popular and athletic boys in school. He was a brave, cunning, attractive guy that had total trust in his best friend Gene. On the other hand, Gene was a lonely, self-sufficient intellectual. The two became great friends, but Finny is eventually led down a trail of betrayal, deceit, and jealousy by his best friend. Gene couldn't imagine that a person of Finny's stature would want to be his best friend. Gene envied Finny for all that Gene believed Finny to be. His envy grew to a point where he was subconsciously willing to injure Finny for being the great athlete that he happened to be. To Finny's dismay, Gene succeeded in injuring his leg, shattering it in multiple places. Finny's perfection was the basis for Gene's resentment towards him. Gene envied everything that Finny did. Finny seemed to be so perfect to Gene. Finny was so confident that he didn't c
Unfortunately, Finny died due to the negligence of the school doctor. The doctor felt that because the bone had such a clean break that he could do it himself in the school infirmary. When the doctor went to set Finny's leg, bone marrow escaped into his blood stream which stopped his heart. Gene, upon hearing this bad news did not cry. Gene felt that, along with Finny, part of himself had died, and he states that you just don't cry at your own funeral. Gene went back to his school knowing that he was partially responsible for Finny's death. Gene eventually had to go to Finny and tell him the truth about causing the fall. However, when he got to him it was Finny who apologized, saying, "I'm sorry about that, Gene." Phineas was sorry that he had the feeling that Gene actually caused him to fall. Gene and Finny started a Super Suicide Society. The society was formed in the summer of 1942. The society met every night, and the meeting of this society was always opened with a jump from both Finny and Gene out of an immense tree that hung out over a nearby river. It was quite a large jump to be able to clear the branch and be able to hit the river. After several weeks, Finny came up with the idea that they could do a double jump, that is they both were to jump out of the tree at the same time. They proceeded to climb the tree. When they got to the branch that they always jumped from Gene's "...knees bent and... bounced the limb." Finny fell to the ground and shattered his leg upon impact. As a result, Finny's sport's career at Devon forever ceased. When Gene had fully realized this he became depressed realizing that he was the cause of ending his roommate and best friend's ability to play sports. are what others thought about his appearance. One exam
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1190
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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