Essay --

Change For the Better Life changes in an instant. One day you’re just playing with your friends and the next your whole life is ending. The events that happen in a person’s life changes how they are as a person; it can either make them a better person or destroy them. In the novel The Separate Peace Finny grows as a person as the story progresses on, he faces tough situations that reveal he’s inner self. In the beginning of the novel, Finny is an outstanding athlete, friendly, and he is able to talk his way out of any tough situation he gets himself into. He is a type of person who will do anything he wants when he wants; he’s carefree. â€Å"I was beginning to see that Phineas could get away with anything† (Knowles 18). Finny is adventurous, he comes up with things knowing the risk of him getting in trouble is high. â€Å"Finny’s life was ruled by inspiration and anarchy, so he prized a set of rules†(Knowles 26). He almost lived by his own rules, he did what he wanted, what made him happy. He is also quite innocent making him naà ¯ve. â€Å"Finny had deliberately set out to wreck my studies† (Knowles 45). He doesn’t do anything intentionally; he actually thinks so highly of his friends, that they could never do any harm to him. â€Å"No I just wanted to see if I could do it. Now I know. But I don’t want to do it in public†(K nowles 35). In the quote stated, his athletic skills really show and so does his innocence. He didn’t need the whole school to know that he beat a swimming record; him knowing was the best satisfaction he could have. In the midway of the novel, Finny’s life takes a turn and goes downhill from there. Sports are a big part of his life, without it, half of him is basically gone. â€Å"Sports are finished for him, after an accident li... ...ly achieved; when one is able to forgive someone who was set out to ruin their life. All in all, tough situations that a person goes through either make them or break them. In the novel The Separate Peace innocence vanished from Finny. The situations he went through made him understand life better. That life isn’t always full of happiness; there are bumps in the road. He had a harder time accepting that because his life was amazing in the beginning and he didn’t expect it to take a turn that he nearly lost himself. Along with the things he went through he grew as a person; the lost of his innocence made him see things clearer; that there was bad sides to some situations. Finny saw that when Gene confesses that it was his fault that he fell off the tree, but he is mature about it because he was able to forgive Gene. That’s one thing he never lost though, kindness.