In times of war, people and societies change to adapt to the lifestyle war brings with it. In John Knowles’ A Separate Peace the characters must adapt to the lifestyle brought forth by World War II. Some make it through these times better than others and some just don’t make it at all. This brings me to my reasoning for the theme of this novel; “survival of the fittest”. From the beginning of this …showed first 75 words of 470 total…

…showed last 75 words of 470 total…causing him to fall and injure himself. Gene, therefore, is the fittest because he realized his competition for the “fittest” and eliminated it. After all, how many of the characters of A Separate Peace are alive and sane besides Gene? Due to the war and how it causes people to adapt Gene and Phineas were in competition to be “fittest” throughout the whole novel and only Gene survived therefore proving him to be the fittest.