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Summary Of A Separate Peace By John Knowles

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In the story, A Separate Peace, by John Knowles, begins with Gene Forrester, the narrator, visiting his old prep school in New Hampshire that he attended as a young man during World War II, called the Devon school. He becomes close friends with his daredevil roommate Finny. Finny talks Gene into making a dangerous jump out of a tree into a river, and the two start a secret society on this ritual. Once this summer session ends, they meet a class politician, named Brinker. Brinker, Gene, and Finny all become very close, but not alike in ways. Finny and Brinker are actually opposites. In the next few paragraphs, you will learn more about the differences between the summer and winter sessions, and how Finny and Brinker relate to the different sessions. …show more content…

The summer session represents freedom. The boys have a lot of extra free time. They get trips to the beach and are able to play the game “blitzball”. However, once the summer session ends, the winter session begins. The winter session represents structure and discipline. The rules are strictly enforced, and everyone must pay close attention to them. Also, the boys don’t have near as much free time. The war time activities take up all of the extra free time.
One of the main characters, Finny, is most like the summer session. Finny is defined by his spirit. He is very persuasive and can get away with almost anything. “Naturally Finny was going to be the first to try, and just as naturally he was going to inveigle others, us, into trying it with him” (15). This quote shows that Finny was known as a persuasive, dare-devil. He matches the summer session the best, because during the summer sessions the rules were barely enforced, and they had a lot of freedom, like Finnys

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