A Separate Peace

by

John Knowles

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Phineas (“Finny”) Character Analysis

Gene’s best friend and classmate at the Devon School. Finny is a talented athlete and a charismatic student leader who’s earned the respect and admiration of the entire student body. His freewheeling behavior often gets him into trouble, but his charm saves him from every potential disciplinary snag. Finny is forgiving and optimistic, which contrasts with Gene’s more cautious and rational approach to life. In fact, while Gene feels an intense rivalry with Finny, Finny shares none of Gene’s competitive feelings, simply appreciating the beauty of their friendship and treating Gene with the kind of fellow-feeling that comes along with such close relationships. Unfortunately for him, though, Gene’s skepticism interferes with their relationship, since he comes to resent the fact that Finny thinks everyone shares his carefree approach to life. This misunderstanding leads Gene to cause Finny to fall out of a tall tree, thereby ruining his athletic career and altering the course of his life. And though Finny suspects that Gene did this on purpose, he never accuses him of this behavior because he values their friendship too much, believing that it would be wrong to level such claims at his best friend. If anything can be said against Finny, it is that he is overly optimistic and idealistic, choosing to see the best in people instead of focusing on certain harsh realities. Similarly, he hatches a conspiracy theory that World War II is a hoax, insisting upon this to Gene as a way of distracting himself from his disappoint that he can no longer join the military. This is the same kind of denial he applies to his relationship with Gene, choosing to force any suspicion out of his mind until Brinker Hadley forces him to reconstruct the memory of his fall, at which point he realizes that Gene caused his injury. This realization destabilizes his and Gene’s friendship and ultimately leads to Finny’s death, since he tries to run down a set of stairs after hearing the news and ends up falling down them. Despite all that has happened, though, he manages to forgive Gene before dying.

Phineas (“Finny”) Quotes in A Separate Peace

The A Separate Peace quotes below are all either spoken by Phineas (“Finny”) or refer to Phineas (“Finny”). For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
War and Rivalry Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1  Quotes

Nothing endures, not a tree, not love, not even a death by violence. Changed, I headed back through the mud. I was drenched; anybody could see it was time to come in out of the rain.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Related Symbols: The Tree, The Devon School
Page Number: 14
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2  Quotes

I think we reminded them of what peace was like, we boys of sixteen […]. We were careless and wild, and I suppose we could be thought of as a sign of the life the war was being fought to preserve […]. Phineas was the essence of this careless peace.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 24
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 3 Quotes

To keep silent about this amazing happening deepened the shock for me. It made Finny seem too unusual for—not friendship, but too unusual for rivalry. And there were few relationships among us at Devon not based on rivalry.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 45
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 4 Quotes

I found a single sustaining thought. The thought was, You and Phineas are even already. You are even in enmity. You are both coldly driving ahead for yourselves alone […]. I felt better. We were even after all, even in enmity. The deadly rivalry was on both sides after all.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 53
Explanation and Analysis:

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.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Elwin “Leper” Lepellier
Related Symbols: The Tree
Page Number: 59
Explanation and Analysis:

Holding firmly to the trunk, I took a step toward him, and then my knees bent and I jounced the limb. Finny, his balance gone, swung his head around to look at me for an instant with extreme interest, and then he tumbled sideways, broke through the little branches below and hit the bank with a sickening, unnatural thud. It was the first clumsy physical action I had ever seen him make. With unthinking sureness I moved out on the limb and jumped into the river, every trace of my fear of this forgotten.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Related Symbols: The Tree, Fall (Autumn) and Finny's Fall
Page Number: 59
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

Across the hall […] where Leper Lepellier had dreamed his way through July and August amid sunshine and dust motes and windows through which the ivy had reached tentatively into the room, here Brinker Hadley had established his headquarters. Emissaries were already dropping in to confer with him.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley, Elwin “Leper” Lepellier
Related Symbols: Fall (Autumn) and Finny's Fall, The Devon School
Page Number: 74
Explanation and Analysis:

So to Phineas I said, “I’m too busy for sports,” and he went into his incoherent groans and jumbles of words, and I thought the issue was settled until at the end he said, “Listen, pal, if I can’t play sports, you’re going to play them for me,” and I lost part of myself to him then, and a soaring sense of freedom revealed that this must have been my purpose from the first: to become a part of Phineas.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 85
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

In the same way the war, beginning almost humorously with announcements about [no more] maids and days spent at apple-picking, commenced its invasion of the school.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Related Symbols: Fall (Autumn) and Finny's Fall
Page Number: 93
Explanation and Analysis:

To enlist. To slam the door impulsively on the past, to shed everything down to my last bit of clothing, to break the pattern of my life […]. The war would be deadly all right. But I was used to finding something deadly in things that attracted me.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley
Page Number: 100
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 8 Quotes

So the war swept over like a wave at the seashore, gathering power and size as it bore on us, overwhelming in its rush, seemingly inescapable, and then at the last moment eluded by a word from Phineas; I had simply ducked, that was all, and the wave’s concentrated power had hurtled harmlessly overhead.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley
Page Number: 109
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 9 Quotes

It wasn’t the cider which made me surpass myself, it was this liberation we had torn from the gray encroachments of 1943, the escape we had concocted, this afternoon of momentary, illusory, special and separate peace.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 136
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 12 Quotes

You’d get things so scrambled up nobody would know who to fight any more. You’d make a mess, a terrible mess, Finny, out of the war.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley
Page Number: 191
Explanation and Analysis:

I could not escape a feeling that this was my own funeral, and you do not cry in that case.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 194
Explanation and Analysis:

I never killed anybody and I never developed an intense level of hatred for the enemy. Because my war ended before I ever put on a uniform; I was on active duty all my time at school; I killed my enemy there. Only Phineas never was afraid, only Phineas never hated anyone.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 204
Explanation and Analysis:
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Phineas (“Finny”) Quotes in A Separate Peace

The A Separate Peace quotes below are all either spoken by Phineas (“Finny”) or refer to Phineas (“Finny”). For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
War and Rivalry Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1  Quotes

Nothing endures, not a tree, not love, not even a death by violence. Changed, I headed back through the mud. I was drenched; anybody could see it was time to come in out of the rain.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Related Symbols: The Tree, The Devon School
Page Number: 14
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2  Quotes

I think we reminded them of what peace was like, we boys of sixteen […]. We were careless and wild, and I suppose we could be thought of as a sign of the life the war was being fought to preserve […]. Phineas was the essence of this careless peace.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 24
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 3 Quotes

To keep silent about this amazing happening deepened the shock for me. It made Finny seem too unusual for—not friendship, but too unusual for rivalry. And there were few relationships among us at Devon not based on rivalry.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 45
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 4 Quotes

I found a single sustaining thought. The thought was, You and Phineas are even already. You are even in enmity. You are both coldly driving ahead for yourselves alone […]. I felt better. We were even after all, even in enmity. The deadly rivalry was on both sides after all.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 53
Explanation and Analysis:

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.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Elwin “Leper” Lepellier
Related Symbols: The Tree
Page Number: 59
Explanation and Analysis:

Holding firmly to the trunk, I took a step toward him, and then my knees bent and I jounced the limb. Finny, his balance gone, swung his head around to look at me for an instant with extreme interest, and then he tumbled sideways, broke through the little branches below and hit the bank with a sickening, unnatural thud. It was the first clumsy physical action I had ever seen him make. With unthinking sureness I moved out on the limb and jumped into the river, every trace of my fear of this forgotten.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Related Symbols: The Tree, Fall (Autumn) and Finny's Fall
Page Number: 59
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 Quotes

Across the hall […] where Leper Lepellier had dreamed his way through July and August amid sunshine and dust motes and windows through which the ivy had reached tentatively into the room, here Brinker Hadley had established his headquarters. Emissaries were already dropping in to confer with him.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley, Elwin “Leper” Lepellier
Related Symbols: Fall (Autumn) and Finny's Fall, The Devon School
Page Number: 74
Explanation and Analysis:

So to Phineas I said, “I’m too busy for sports,” and he went into his incoherent groans and jumbles of words, and I thought the issue was settled until at the end he said, “Listen, pal, if I can’t play sports, you’re going to play them for me,” and I lost part of myself to him then, and a soaring sense of freedom revealed that this must have been my purpose from the first: to become a part of Phineas.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 85
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 Quotes

In the same way the war, beginning almost humorously with announcements about [no more] maids and days spent at apple-picking, commenced its invasion of the school.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Related Symbols: Fall (Autumn) and Finny's Fall
Page Number: 93
Explanation and Analysis:

To enlist. To slam the door impulsively on the past, to shed everything down to my last bit of clothing, to break the pattern of my life […]. The war would be deadly all right. But I was used to finding something deadly in things that attracted me.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley
Page Number: 100
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 8 Quotes

So the war swept over like a wave at the seashore, gathering power and size as it bore on us, overwhelming in its rush, seemingly inescapable, and then at the last moment eluded by a word from Phineas; I had simply ducked, that was all, and the wave’s concentrated power had hurtled harmlessly overhead.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley
Page Number: 109
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 9 Quotes

It wasn’t the cider which made me surpass myself, it was this liberation we had torn from the gray encroachments of 1943, the escape we had concocted, this afternoon of momentary, illusory, special and separate peace.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 136
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 12 Quotes

You’d get things so scrambled up nobody would know who to fight any more. You’d make a mess, a terrible mess, Finny, out of the war.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”), Brinker Hadley
Page Number: 191
Explanation and Analysis:

I could not escape a feeling that this was my own funeral, and you do not cry in that case.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 194
Explanation and Analysis:

I never killed anybody and I never developed an intense level of hatred for the enemy. Because my war ended before I ever put on a uniform; I was on active duty all my time at school; I killed my enemy there. Only Phineas never was afraid, only Phineas never hated anyone.

Related Characters: Gene Forrester (speaker), Phineas (“Finny”)
Page Number: 204
Explanation and Analysis: