Finney’s Image and the Development of his Character

Phineas, otherwise known “Finny”, is portrayed as a kind, fun, and forgiving soul. In the end of the book Finny, sadly, passed away from a bone marrow infection. Finny did not deserve this fate because he was very forgiving to everyone he met. He had outstanding character and brightened the life of the people around him. He did his peers a great justice by helping people see the world in a new light and they did not return this favor.

Phineas showed his kindness in many ways one of them was forgiveness towards Gene for his horrible act of pushing Finny from a tree in the school.

Gene returns to his dorm one day after admitting to Finny that he was the one who shook the tree to find him sitting in the room, “Hi pal, where’s the brass band”(102), he says to Gene as he walks in. By calling him pal Phineas has shown he has already for given Gene for the horrible thing he had done, that may have ruined his future of choice. He continues to be an amazing friend to Gene and an important person in his life. When Phineas dies the readers feel sorry for him because he did not deserve death for all the good deeds he had done for people, Gene especially.

In the book A Separate Peace, the character Brinker lets off the traits mean-spirited, condescending, and cocky. He does evil things to several people repeatedly during many parts of the book. He pesters Gene a multitude of times because he knows his secret of pushing Finny of the tree and breaking his leg. Brinker does this again when he makes Phineas come to a meeting he organized to confront Gene for pushing him off the tree.

This ends in Phineas breaking his leg for the second time while rushing down the stairs crying. His leg gets infected by his bone marrow and this leads to his death. Holding this meeting was a very cruel thing to do to both Phineas and Gene, and it makes Brinker partially responsible for the death of Phineas. He says many things that could be seen as callous as well. “ He’s crippled and that’s that. He’s got to accept it and unless we start acting perfectly natural about it, even kid him about it once in a while he never will” (160). This was very insensitive and a very evil thing to say given the circumstances. Phineas’s leg had just been broken and most of his dreams had been lost, so he needed time to recover from this. Brinker suggested that they don’t help him along his way to recovery at all and even make fun of him. At the end of this book, Hadley Brinker is unliked, and the reader feels as if he is a cruel, evil person,

Lepellier, also known as Leper, is portrayed as quiet, peaceful, and kind in the beginning of A Separate Peace, but his mood slowly changes to crazy near the end of the book. Leper is not one of Gene’s closest friends at first, but as the book goes on they become exceptional friends. One day, Gene is told that Leper has enlisted as a soldier in the war. This, naturally, surprises everyone in the school because Leper is a peaceful, nature-loving boy, and it does not seem like him to enlist in a war, the opposite of peace. Soon, Gene receives a letter addressed to him from Lepellier saying that he had “escaped.”

Gene dismisses his suspicion that he has fled from the army because it would be immoral. When he goes to visit him he learns that Leper had run away from the army because they were going to put him in a division for insane people, that would ruin his life. He rambles on and begins to say very odd and weird things, “the idea of his face on a woman’s body. That’s what made me psycho”(149). This prompts Gene to realize that Leppelier has truly gone crazy and he soon exits. This leaves the reader feeling mixed emotions towards Leper. On one hand they pity him for being driven crazy by his enlistment at the army. On the other hand, they like Leper for his peacefully kind, and giving personality.

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