A Separate Peace

            
             In the novel, A Separate Peace by John Knowles, Gene Forrester experiences internal and external conflicts. Gene has trouble finding out who he really during adolescences because he tries to be like his best friend, Finny. Gene becomes envious of Finny because Gene can't be like Finny. Soon after Gene hurts his best friend, Finny, by jouncing the limb of the tree making Finny lose his balance and fall, causing Finny to break his leg. Jouncing the limb of the tree didn't resolve any of Gene's conflicts, it just made room for more.
             Finny often tells Gene that he is his best friend, but Gene is unable to respond to this. "I should have told him then that he was my best friend also and rounded off what he had said. I started to; I nearly did. But something held me back. Perhaps I was stopped by that level of feeling, deeper than thought, which contains the truth." Gene is caught up in how popular Finny is and how athletic Finny is, that he is unable to see that Finny is the best friend he could ever have. Gene tries very hard to be like Finny, but when he figures out that he can't, he becomes jealous and full of envy. His jealous increase and cause him to jounce the limb and have Finny plunge to the ground, taking away what he loves the most, sports. "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. I couldn't stand this . 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.