Gene can't reciprocate by saying "best pal" to his friend Phineas because his emotions are all tangled up by his jealousy and envy towards Phineas. After Phineas beats a record school swim time at the Devon School, he proposes to Gene that they go to the beach. The two boys decide to camp by the dunes and sleep on the beach. Before they go to bed, Phineas tells a "nighttime monologue" which at the end he tells Gene, "And at this teenage period in your life the proper person is your best pal...which is what you are," (48). Gene's jealousy of Phineas's freak athletic ability has led him to resent his closest friend. His resentment of his skill and values that make him better than Gene is what has clouded their friendship in his mind. It has led him to be more focused on his envy than it has on his happiness. So when Gene is about to respond, he says, "Perhaps I was stopped by that level of feeling, deeper than thought, which contains the truth," (48). This shows that jealousy and envy can make two best friends some of the most prominent rivals. Gene's mind is so clouded by jealousy that when his best friend says they're best pals, Gene isn't able to put aside the emotions, and tell his best friend they're best pals.
What do you think Phineas is feeling about this? How would you feel if the person you thought was your best friend didn't say you were their best friend?
I agree that Gene's jealousy over Phineas is certainly clouding his judgement, though I also believe that it is clouding his views on the world and himself. Gene decides that the reason Phineas has started Blitzball and the Super Suicide Society of the Summer Session and dragging Gene to wherever, is because Phineas wants to make sure Gene doesn’t have enough time to study, therefore, Gene can’t finish top of the class. Gene’s reasoning for why Phineas would want this, is so Finny is superior in their relationship. However, when Gene is adamant against going to a Society meeting, Finny is completely okay with this and offers for Gene to stay, showing how Finny isn’t trying to distract Gene from his studies. As the two walk to the meeting (which Gene agreed to go anyways), Gene states that “Now I knew that there never was and never could have been any rivalry between s. I was not of the same quality as he. I couldn’t stand this,” (Knowles 59). It seems here, that Gene is enraged by the fact that Finny wasn’t trying to manipulate Gene, because in truth, Gene is simply not at the same level as Finny and he’s being forced to realize this. Gene, out of jealousy, created the idea that Finny isn’t truly superior to him, the only reason he is, is because Finny was trying to manipulate Gene out of top spot. Gene’s envy caused him to jump to conclusions about Finny, because only with the idea that it’s all Finny’s doing, could Gene equal or top Finny.
ReplyDeleteI think that Gene's jealousy is also making him self-centered, and making him a less good person. Since the environment at the Devon School is one of great pressure, he begins to obsess over rivalry, and think that Phineas and his friends are sabotaging his quest to be the best student. He thinks "Finny had deliberately set out to wreck my studies," (Knowles, 53), because of all the excursions Finny was taking him on (which in hindsight were actually for Finny's fun). He begins to be suspicious of everyone, and work hard, not for the sake of the information or the work, but because he wants to beat everyone. Gene "began to see that Chet was weakened by the very genuineness of his interest in learning," (Knowles, 54). I think that it is much more likely that Chet Douglass was learning the material because he was interested, and took pleasure in learning. However Gene is not working hard because he dreams of a career, or using his work, he is working hard for titles and awards: because that is what the school seems to value. Gene's obsession with rivalry makes him a person focused on only apparent success, which is detrimental to his character.
ReplyDeleteI think that it was difficult for Gene to reciprocate the gesture of affection because he doesn't want to affirm that they are equals. In the first few chapters, Finny constantly is better than Gene in Athletics and being courageous. These traits are not Gene's strongsuits, which causes him to re-evaluate their pecking order. Throughout this chapter, he starts to think that Finny is trying to sabotage him which causes Gene to attempt to be better than Finny in any way he could. As Gene notices that Finny is getting better grades and being wild, he does not take that to mean that Finny doesn't want to fail, and rather looks at it as an act of aggression. This feeling of enmity and rivalry is so pervasive that even Gene doesn't notice it at first. This "feeling, deeper than thought"(48), keeps Gene from showing how he feels.
ReplyDeleteGene rejects Finny’s friendly gesture of calling him his best pal because he is so jealous of Finny that he can’t even imagine them being best friends. Everything Finny does Gene evaluates and takes so seriously because of his jealousy. But, both characters have jealousy for each other not just Gene. When Finny says this Gene being so jealous could think of it as hi trying to get inside his head which would help him be better. This awareness reminds me of the theme of war that is constantly overlying. When it says, "Perhaps I was stopped by that level of feeling, deeper than thought, which contains the truth," (48), this is proved. It is proved because the “truth” is the jealousy between the two boys and their constant rivalry that they don't really acknowledge.
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