STUDY GUIDE - A SEPARATE PEACE
Name___________________
ENGLISH 10
CHAPTER 1
1. What is the setting of the novel? When and where?
2. How long has it been since the narrator has been there?
3. What is a flashback? Where does it begin (page #) in the book?
4. Who is the character you meet? (name & nickname)
5. What stunt doe the boys try? What does the stunt symbolize?
6. What kind of place is Devon?
CHAPTER 2
1. What is the name of the narrator?
2. How old are the boys?
3. Describe Finny’s personality?
4. Why does Finny wear the pink shirt?
5. What club is formed?
CHAPTER 3
1. What sport does Finny invent? Why is it so named?
2. Describe the “world” in which Gene lives.
3. What record does Finny break?
4. Why does he want to keep it a secret?
5. How does Finny feel about Gene?
CHAPTER 4
1. What does Gene realize about Finny?
2. What decision does Gene make about his own goals?
3. What happens to Finny? How does this happen?
CHAPTER 5
1. Who is Dr. Stanpole?
2. What does Gene admit to himself?
3. What is the prognosis for Finny?
4. When Gene asks Finny, “Do you remember what made you fall?”, how does Finny
prove his friendship?
5. Where is home for Finny after the school session is over?
6. Where is home for Gene?
7. On the way back to school, where does Gene go? What does he confess?
8. How does finny react to this confession?
CHAPTER 6
1. Who is Brinker?
2. What is Gene’s last name?
3. Who is Quackenbush? What is he like?
4. Why does Gene really fight him?
5. Who is Mr. Ludsbury?
6. When Finny calls, what does he tell Gene that Gene must do for him?
CHAPTER 7
1. Of what does Brinker accuse Gene?
2. What is the Butt room?
3. How do the boys tease Gene?
4. How does Gene take it?
5. What is the war poem that Brinker writes?
6. Describe Leper Lepellier’s personality.
7. What did the boys from Devon do for the war effort?
8. What did Leper do instead?
9. On the way back to school, who arrives?
CHAPTER 8
A SEPARATE PEACE
1. What sacrifice at Devon does the war make necessary?
2. What bombshell does Brinker throw?
3. How does Finny take it?
4. On whom does Finny put the blame for the war?
5. What does Gene mean when he says: “I have never since forgotten the dazed look
on Finny’s face when he thought that on the first day of his return to Devon I was
going to desert him. I didn’t know why he had chosen me, why it was only
to me
that he could show the most humbling side of his handicap.”
6. What challenge does Finny give Gene?
CHAPTER 9
1. What did Leper do? Why?
2. What did Finny plan?
3. What prized treasure did Brinker provide?
4. What did Gene do in the decathelon?
5. What provided “a separate peace”?
6. What news does the telegram bring?
CHAPTER 10
1. Where did Gene find Leper?
2. What happened to Leper?
3. What was a Section Eight discharge?
4. Why did Gene knock Leper out of his chair?
5. How did Gene react to Leper’s story of the service?
6. Why did he react this way?
7. Why didn’t Gene fight in the war? (beginning of chapter)
8. What were Leper’s symptoms?
CHAPTER 11
1. When Gene returned to Devon, what did he he find Finny doing?
2. What did Finny have on the wall over his bed?
3. What did Gene have on the wall over his bed?
4. What did Brinker mean when he said, “We’vev alrady got two men sidelined.”?
5. According to Brinker, what must Finny face up to?
6. According to Brinker, why doesn’t Gebe enlist? What do you think are the reasons?
7. What made Finny acknowledge that there really was a war going on?
8. Where do Brinker and his cohorts take Gene and Finny?
9. What does Brinker force Finny to talk about?
10. What does Finny try to do for Gene?
11. Who is brought in to tell the “true story”? Does this person clear up the case?
Why? Why not?
12. What happened to Finny?
CHAPTER 12
1. Why does Gene laugh and cry simultaneously?
2. When Gene crawls into the window, what does Finny yell at him?
3. What does Finny try to do? What happens?
4. Where did Gene sleep at night? Why?
5. What did Finny admit that he’d been trying to do all winter?
6. What does Gene tell Finny about Finny’s being in the war?
7. What did Gene and Finny talk about?
8. How do they both feel after their talk?
9. What happened to Finny?
CHAPTER 13
1. What comes to Devon?
2. In which service does Gene enlist?
3. What branch did Brinker want to join?
4. How does his father feel about this?
5. Why can’t Gene talk about Finny in the past tense?
6. What does Gene mean when he says, “I never killed anybody...because my war
ended before I put on a uniform...I killed my enemy there...”?
THINK ABOUT THE FOLLOWING:
1. Explain the meaning of the title.
2. Explain the importance of the war to the novel.
3. Explain Gene’s feelings about Finny. Include his first impressions, what he learned
about academic achievement, what he knew about Finny’s need for him, what he
realized about their final talk, and why he said that he killed his enemy at school.