Rylee Hatch, period 2
Academic English 10
March 9, 2015

"There is plenty of blame to go around here" -Suzanne Collins. In the novel, "A
Separate Peace.", one of the Main characters, Finny, passes away from bone marrow escaping into his heart during a surgery on his leg. His death was a multiple causation based upon the actions of three characters in the story. Finny
(himself), Gene Forrester (his best friend) , and Doctor Stanpole (the doctor who was operating when Finny passed.) all contributed to Finny's passing.

One person who is responsible for Finny's death is Finny himself. He is responsible for this because Finny did not maintain his composure during the trial and bolted out of the courtroom, falling down the steps, all while knowing he was still injured. For example, on page 168 Finny says "I just don't care. Nevermind." and then he "plunged out of the doors." You can tell by what he says that he was upset about some of the things that were said during the trial. When he plunges out the doors, you can tell he lost his ''cool". Another example is on page 169 when the narrator states "Then these separate sounds collided into the general tumult of his body falling clumsily down the stairs." This quote goes into quite detail and says

how he tumbled down the stairs and how the fall sounded. Honestly, this shows that he made the decision to burst out, which led to him falling down which could only be his fault alone. Opponents to this theory may argue by saying if Leper wasn't at the hearing, he wouldn't have upset Finny and he wouldn't have fallen down the stairs. Well, if Finny would have controlled his emotions and stayed at the hearing, he wouldn't have freaked out and fell down the stairs.

Next, Finny's best friend, Gene, is also partly responsible for his friend's untimely death. Gene is responsible because he is the one who jounced the limb that caused the first accident. On page 52, Gene even admits to jousting the tree limb. He says "Holding firmly to the trunk, my knees bent, causing him to joust a limb." Gene also explains how the limb broke again on page 62, explaining, "I jounced the limb, I caused it...I deliberately jounced the limb so that you would fall off." That statement shows that Gene knew what he was doing, he meant for the limb to break and for Finny to get hurt. Some may argue and say that Gene didn't joust the limb on purpose; it was a hidden impulse. In refutation, even though it was an 'accident', it still happened. If gene hadn't been in the tree, would Finny still have fallen? Therefor, Gene is the one who jounced the limb, causing Finny's first injury. Also, if the first injury hadn't happened, would Finny still have fallen