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Finny How Things Change In the novel "A Separate Peace," by John Knowles, a boy named Gene visits his high school 15 years after graduating in order to find an inner peace. While attending the private boys school during the second World War, Gene's best friend Phineas died and Gene knows he was partially responsible. Phineas, or Finny as he was sometimes called, was the most popular boy in school. He was a handsome, taunting, daredevil athlete. Gene, on the other hand, was a lonely, self-sufficient intellectual. Somehow the two became good friends, or so Finny thought. Gene, unfortunately, was bitten by the green-eyed monster of jealousy. Gene just couldn't come to grips with the idea that a person of Finny's stature would want to be his friend. Gene's envy grew to a point where he was willing to severely injure Finny for being too perfect. Unfortunately for Finny, Gene succeeded. Finny's seeming perfection, his strong beliefs, and his ability to forgive trace his development throughout the novel. Finny's seeming perfection was the basis for Gene's resentment towards him. Gene thought that everything Finny did was perfect, which just upset Gene all the more. Finny was so perfect that he didn't care w