A Separate Peace Thesis Paper

Upon realizing his mistake and discovering that Phineas does not share Gene's envy and hatred, Gene's isolation and self-loathing deepen and he intentionally cripples the one person who wants to be his friend.Phineas becomes a metaphor for the peace that is lost when Gene is too afraid to identify the enemy within himself.Gene assumes that Finny and he despise each other, until he becomes aware of how flawless Finny really is, which Gene loathes....

Tags: Dissertation On Intercultural CommunicationEssay Paper Writing ServicesProblem Solving Involving SubtractionNhd Research PaperActivities For Problem SolvingThe Chocolate War Essay Introduction

And amidst the turmoil of his adolescence, it is the victory of the "dark forces" of human nature that make Gene realize that each person is alone with his enemy, that the only significant wars are not made by external causes, but "by something ignorant in the human heart" (193).

The novel's conflict arises out of Gene's refusal to recognize his own feelings of jealousy and insecurity as the "real enemy." Instead, his fears are projected onto his closest companion, Phineas, whom Gene suspects of possessing his own feelings of envy and self-loathing.

Sometimes for a conflict in a friendship to be resolved a person must resolve their inner conflicts and conquer their fear of it.

An example of this from the novel is when Gene is battling with himself over how to tell Finny what he did.

An example of conflicts between two friends is Gene and Finny.

In their friendship conflict did not get resolved right away; it kept on growing and building up because Gene could not get himself to tell Finny what really happened at the tree.

This is important because no one is perfect and if you can't accept a friend's strengths and weaknesses then you won't have many friends.

An example from the novel is the way Finny accepts ...

They just kept putting it off until Gene finally told Finny.

This conflict got worse until Finny broke his leg twice.