Duality In John Knowles A Separate Peace

Through his use of duality in A Separate Peace, John Knowles is attempting to convey to the reader that as we mature and come to realize who we are, we do many questionable things. It is not until we are older and reflect upon these things that we see what we have done and are able to accept responsibility for these actions. The narration of A Separate Peace alternates from the perspective of a younger Gene and an older Gene. Younger Gene’s opinion on life drastically changes as he grows as a person. The portion of the novel told from this perspective exhibits an immature and competitive state of mind. As said by Gordon E. Slethaug in his essay The Play of the Double in A Separate Peace, John Knowles “compares two fundamentally different
A consistent theme where the story is told and adult Gene offers a different interpretation of a situation is shown with this. Very early on in the novel is it obvious that the dual narration offers two vastly different perspectives, and that the one of adult Gene is the most reliable as it serves as an observation from the outside. As said by Ian Kennedy in his essay Dual Perspective Narrative and the Character of Phineas in A Separate Peace, young Gene “...attributes to Phineas characteristics that Gene the adult knows to be entirely absent from his personality, and it is only when the adult voice chooses to reveal to us the absolutely falsity of these misconceptions that we discover, as Gene did himself, that Finny is incapable of harboring evil thought and feelings towards others.” The thought that Phineas could possess the ability to wish evil upon another person is proven to be clearly incorrect throughout the novel and the idea had only arisen from young Gene’s unnecessary hatred towards him. As an adult, Gene is able to realize that Phineas never had malicious intentions towards him or anyone else. Towards the end of the novel, adult Gene says, “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” (Knowles, Pg. 204). The war which Gene is referring to when saying this is not a
These two together

help the reader to understand that coming-of-age involves a great deal of self-confrontation and it is not until we have reached a certain level of maturity that we are able to accept and reflect upon the