A Separate Peace

From Goodreads

A Separate Peace
John Knowles

I remember disliking this book when we read it in high school. I don't remember the reason for disliking it, but after having finished it again I probably think it was something to do with it being a rather boring read. There isn't anything too intriguing about the book. At times, Gene, the main character, has an almost Augustinian obsession with his crime and, without going into spoilers, the amount of 'pranks' going on within the setting of this book, make his crime to be about as bad as St. Augustine's stealing a pear for the sake of stealing, though in this case the consequences were worse. Honeslty, the only really poignant statement written about this guilt-obsession is when Gene is dealing with the fallout of the accident, not the crime, that brought about the conclusion. Gene think to himself, "I had to be right in never talking about what you could not change, and I had to make many people agree that I was right". Gene's guilt, in my opinion, is still misplaced. His crime was self-invented. But, his feeling guilty and living with the consequences by stuffing it struck a resonance with me in that line. The not talking about it was the semblance of control. The not talking about it was crucial to Gene's continuing to exist.

The end of the book is fairly anti-climatic and I wouldn't strongly recommend this book to anyone. It's not a bad book, but I don't think it necessarily deserves the moniker of a "classic". The final chapter has an interesting take on what life in war time does to you, what life in extremely stressful situations does to various people. Today, there are Lepers who crack under the pressure, there are the Ludsbury's who are too good for the muck and mire of the situation and peer down on it from a safe, snobbish perch and there are the Brinker's who withdraw and, "develop a careless general resentment". I am a Brinker in some respects. But, in spite of somehow earning the nickname Phineas from my high school friend, Warren, I don't understand the character's significance. Knowles lifts him as an oddly idealized and morphed messianic figure in the book; and frankly, I just don't get it.