A Separate Peace Chapter 9 Summary
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So Gene falls into Finny's perception of the world, where there is no war. It's not that he really
believes the crazy theory, he says, it's just that he feels happy and at peace, so the rest of the
world is removed from him.
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Nothing shook his perception of reality – not even Leper enlisting in the service.
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Um…what??
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Yes, that's right, Leper enlisted. One day in January, a recruiter from the ski troops showed a
video of, well, ski troops, all in uniform, gracefully gliding down a mountain. Leper was
immediately taken in. He had no idea that you could do something like ski in the military. So
he signs up and is gone a week later. Since he was almost eighteen, he enlisted just in time to
choose his service instead of risking getting drafted and being assigned one.
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It would have been better, says Gene, if Brinker had been the first to go. This would have
made sense, and the boys would all have felt his absence and known the war as a fact in their
daily lives, but it was harder to notice at all that Leper had left. They didn't know how to
reconcile his absence with the reality of the war.
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Then, one day in the Butt Room, Brinker is reading from the newspaper about a supposed
attempt on Hitler's life. It must have been Leper's doing, he concludes. Ha!
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And that becomes the way that the boys "establish a liaison" with the war. Everything they
read about, everything on the news, all directly involves Leper.
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Still, at night, Gene hopes that Leper is as heroic as they all think. He wonders if he himself
will someday be able to measure up to the army and its standards.
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Finny remains the only one outside of the joke. He doesn't want to play along and imagine
Leper in various epic scenarios, so he draws Gene away from that crowd, away from the Butt
Room all together, into a world inhabited only by the two of them, while Gene continues to
train for the Olympics of 1944.
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Saturday afternoons, explains Gene, are boring. There's never anything to do, especially in the
winter. So when Phineas one day suggests that the boys plan a Winter Carnival for the next
Saturday, Gene agrees to go along with it and takes a position as head of the snow statues
committee.
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Brinker, who has by now withdrawn from his various "I'm a model student" roles, even takes
part. He's a rebel now, notes Gene.
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The day of the Carnival arrives, and the “sky was battleship gray” (131). Finny has
arranged the multifarious collection of prizes, ranging from Finny's icebox to a marked-up
dictionary to a forged draft registration card, to be set on a table that has been dragged
outside. The opening ceremonies become rambunctious as the participants imbibe in hard
cider and Gene forces some down the throat of the resisting Brinker. The games begin
and Gene, who has been training, is crowned champion after excelling at the decathlon.
"It wasn't the cider which made me surpass myself," he writes, "It was this liberation we
had torn from the gray encroachments of 1943, the escape we had concocted, this
afternoon of momentary, illusory, special and separate peace" (128).
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Brinker, despite his recent transformation, still tries to take control of the games. Phineas
galvanizes the boys into tackling him. Fortunately for all, Brinker decides to play along and
takes it as all good fun.
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(Phineas 1, Brinker 0.)
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Finny declares the games open and, to represent as much, lights the Iliad on fire. Oh, joy.
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The boys, ablaze with the passion of youth (read: hard cider) frolic about in the snow. Finny
orders Gene through a series of tasks to prove his qualifications for the Olympics, and Gene
performs spectacularly.
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The celebratory atmosphere is interrupted when a classmate comes outside to deliver a
telegram to Gene. The telegram is from Leper, who writes
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“I have escaped and need help. I am at Christmas location. No need to risk address
here. My safety depends on you coming at once.
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Your best friend,
Elwin Leper Lepellier.
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Yes, that will put a damper on your carnival'ing.