A Separate Peace Reading Guide
Chapter 1
1. Who is the narrator?
2. How long ago has Gene been a student at Devon School?
3. How does the school look to him?
4. What war was going on fifteen years ago?
5. What discovery does Gene make?
6. Where is Devon School located?
7. What particular things does Gene come to see?
8. What does he mean by “anybody could see it was time to come in out of the rain?”
9. Where does the author begin talking of the past - - - a flashback?
10. What year is it when the story takes place?
11. Who is Gene’s friend and roommate?
12. What is Finny the first to do?
13. Who follows him and who refuses?
14. What two things does Finny dislike about Gene?
15. Discuss the two boys’ actions. Who is stronger?
16. Is this a study of Gene or Phineas?
Chapter 2
1. Is their absence from dinner noticed and what is done about it?
2. Because of Finny, what does the faculty do?
3. What is the other reason the faculty becomes so tolerant?
4. How does Finny celebrate the allies’ bombing of Central Europe?
5. After convincing Mr. Patch-Withers of the bombing, what almost brings about Finny’s downfall?
6. How does Mr. Patch-Withers reprimand Finny?
7. Where have the boys been when the school tie incident occurs?
8. How does Finny manage to get away with his pranks?
9. Does Gene consider it a compliment to have Finny for his best friend?
10. What do they do after the tea?
Chapter 2 continued
11. What does Gene say when Finny complains of too much talk at the tea?
12. Does Gene agree when Finny says, “I don’t really believe we bombed Central Europe, do you?”
13. How is the summer spent?
14. Who jumps first, the second time?
15. What is formed at that moment?
16. Do you really get to know Gene?
Chapter 3
1. What does Gene realize about the near accident?
2. How does the Suicide Society succeed?
3. Why does Gene always jump, in spite of how he feels?
4. Does Finny always win?
5. What is created because Finny finds a large and heavy leather-covered ball, a medicine ball?
6. Who is the best player of blitzball?
7. What one point of the game does Leper create?
8. Is the war real to Gene?
9. What other thing does Gene think about?
10. During this summer session, what does Finny accomplish?
11. Does the school recognize the new record?
12. What does Gene say about this feat accomplished by Finny?
13. After this great event, what rule do the boys break next?
14. Where do they spend the night?
15. What does Finny tell Gene and what is Gene’s answer?
16. Is Gene left shadowy purposely?
Chapter 4
1. After the night on the beach, what does Gene see next morning for the first time in his life?
2. What does Gene now remember?
3. Do they eat breakfast before they leave?
4. How does Gene do on his trigonometry test?
Chapter 4 continued
5. After an afternoon of blitzball and an evening meeting of the Suicide Society, what does Finny tell Gene?
6. What does Gene suddenly realize?
7. What is the result of Gene’s understanding of the situation?
8. What does Phineas do about Gene’s studying?
9. What is Finny’s downfall?
10. What conclusion does Gene finally come to?
11. What does Gene admit to himself?
12. What does Gene tell Mr. Prud’homme one day?
13. What happens on the night before the final French exam?
14. What idea does Finny have?
15. What happens?
16. What is Gene’s motivation in pushing Phineas off the tree?
Chapter 5
1. What does Gene find out about Phineas?
2. What bothers Gene?
3. What does Gene do one evening when he is alone in his room?
4. What clothes does he put on?
5. How does Gene feel?
6. What does Gene see when he looks in the mirror?
7. What does Gene decide?
8. Who finally tells Gene about Finny?
9. What else does he tell Gene?
10. What do Gene and Finny talk about?
11. After a month’s vacation at home, where does Gene go on his way back to school?
12. What does Gene tell Finny?
13. How does Finny reply?
14. After the argument, what happens?
15. What lie does Gene tell Finny?
Chapter 5 continued
16. What mistake does Gene make in his relationship to Phineas?
Chapter 6
1. The first Summer Session had been held last summer, what session is in the winter?
2. How does the term start?
3. What is the real point of the sermon on the first morning?
4. How many students are there?
5. Who has moved into the room across from Gene?
6. Instead of going in to see Brinker, where does Gene go?
7. What two rivers, divided by a dam, are at Devon?
8. Who is the crew manager?
9. What happens?
10. Whom does Gene meet on the way back to the dorm?
11. When the master asks about the gambling that had taken place last summer, does
Gene admit anything?
12. What does Mr. Ludsbury tell Gene to do?
13. Who calls long distance?
14. How does this chapter end?
15. Does Gene understand Phineas?
Chapter 7
1. When Brinker comes in to see Gene, what does he find Gene doing?
2. What kind of a person is Brinker?
3. Does Brinker have a room to himself?
4. Of what does Brinker accuse Gene?
5. Where do they go?
6. What does Brinker tell the boys?
7. What does one boy ask?
8. What is the answer?
9. How does Gene handle the questioning?
10. What is the war poem Brinker wrote?
Chapter 7 continued
11. How do the boys keep busy besides studying?
12. What else do the boys do for the war effort?
13. What does Leper do instead of shoveling?
14. After an extremely difficult day and on their way back to school, what do the boys talk about?
15. What is Gene’s surprise when he reaches his room?
16. Who do Leper and Brinker represent?
Chapter 8
1. What does Gene discover about Finny?
2. What bombshell does Brinker throw into the room the next morning?
3. How does Phineas take the news?
4. How does Gene knock the shock out of Finny?
5. What does this do to Brinker?
6. What figure of speech is “white cupolas on roofs . . . like Pilgrim bonnets”?
7. What makes walking so difficult for Finny?
8. What does Finny do his first day back at school?
9. Where do they go and what do they do?
10. What else does Finny say?
11. On whom does he put the blame?
12. When Gene tries to laugh it off and asks Finny why he and some fat old men are the only privileged people
to get the joke, what is Finny’s answer?
13. Since Gene could find no answer to this, what does he do?
14. What does Finny decide?
15. In the meantime, what has Gene been doing?
Chapter 9
1. Because they are so busy, what thoughts about the war does Gene have?
2. How does it happen that Leper enlists?
3. How soon does Leper leave?
4. How do the boys accept the fact of Leper’s enlistment?
5. What is the final statement about Leper’s part in the war?
Chapter 9 continued
6. How do Gene and Finny pass most of their time?
7. What idea does Finny have to break up the boring Saturday afternoons?
8. Are they all excited about this new project?
9. Where is the Carnival held?
10. Where are the statues placed?
11. What are the prizes?
12. Who supplies the music?
13. Who are represented in the snow statues?
14. Why is Brinker so upset?
15. What brings Gene out of his feeling of having achieved an afternoon of “separate peace?”
16. What is the significance of Leper’s going to war?
Chapter 10
1. What does Gene do that night for the first time in his life?
2. Why doesn’t he fight in the war?
3. Where does he go on this first nightmare trip, after getting the telegram?
4. Where is Leper when Gene arrives?
5. What does Leper tell Gene?
6. What is a Section Eight discharge?
7. When Gene doesn’t sympathize properly, what does Leper tell him?
8. When Leper goes all to pieces and cries and cries, why doesn’t Gene leave?
9. What does Mrs. Lepellier suggest the two boys do after lunch?
10. What are some of the things that happen at camp?
11. Why can’t Leper sleep at night?
12. How does Gene react to Leper’s story?
13. Where does Gene go?
14. Why is Gene so upset?
15. What does he say at the end of this chapter?
16. Discuss the meaning of this meeting of Leper and Gene
Chapter 11
1. When Gene returns to Devon and looks for Phineas, where does he find him?
2. What is the only conflict Finny has ever believed in?
3. Where are the Fields Beyond?
4. How does he get into the fight?
5. How do they finally end the fight?
6. What does Gene ask Finny?
7. What does Finny say about his leg?
8. What does Gene have on the wall over his bed?
9. What ends Finny’s special inventions to get through the winter?
10. Does Brinker warn Gene that he might do something about Finny’s condition?
11. What does Finny tell Gene about Leper?
12. On what point do the two boys agree?
13. Whey they reach their room, what takes place?
14. How does Finny act?
15. What does Finny tell the boys?
16. Does Leper tell his story?
17. What does one of the judges cry out?
18. What happens to Phineas?
19. What is a theme of the novel?
Chapter 12
1. What do the boys do?
2. How do they get Phineas to the hospital?
3. What does Dr. Stanpole tell Gene?
4. When Mr. Ludsbury tells Gene to go to the dormitory, where does Gene go?
5. Of what does Gene think?
6. How does he locate the room?
7. What thoughts roam around in Gene’s head?
8. Does Gene get into Finny’s room in the infirmary?
Chapter 12 continued
9. How does Phineas greet Gene?
10. What does Gene manage to say?
11. When he leaves, how is Finny?
12. Where does Gene go after leaving Phineas?
13. After he wakes up and goes back to his room, what does he find?
14. What does Finny tell Gene?
15. What happens to Finny?
16. What is the significance of the title?
Chapter 13
1. When you say “Devon” to any of the alumni, of what do they think?
2. How does the Far Common differ?
3. What does Gene see out of his window?
4. What do Brinker and Gene say about Leper?
5. What else do the boys see from the window?
6. How does Gene feel?
7. What has Brinker come to say?
8. How does Gene answer?
9. What does Gene say about Brinker?
10. How does Mr. Hadley answer?
11. What is the difference in their enthusiasm?
12. What does Brinker say about the war?
13. When Gene suggests that his dad doesn’t want to be left out, what does Brinker say?
14. Of what does Gene think as he cleans out his locker?
15. What makes Gene feel that his schooling is over?
16. Does Gene feel that all his hatred is gone now?
17. What are Gene’s thoughts at the end of the chapter?
18. What “separate peace” is negotiated?
19. What symbolic moment is tied to this theme?