this is an outsiders (and cobra kai) blog now

also a separate peace that has absolutely taken over my brain

[girlhelpsworld]

I hate that I have to post this but here's a DNI

Do not interact if you are:

Radfem/terf/gender critical

Aphobic/panphobic/biphobic/enbyphobic/etc

Racist/xenophobic/neo-nazi/antisemitic/etc

Real person shipper/proshipper

D/dlg, c/gl, or anything else like that

Credit to evillittlecherry on DA for the pfp

Follows/likes from water-that-makes-the-frogs-gay

[mrpickelsafterdark]

Gene switching up on finny SO quickly after he literally saved him from falling in chapter two compared to chapter 3 is the most hilarious thing I’ve ever seen like bro literally you were glazing him a PAGE ago wth💔😭

[genefinny-deactivated20230913]

I STAND FOR ONE FLAG AND ONE FLAG ONLY

[seniorloser]

i don’t like them

[a-silly-poll-side-blog-yay]

Hi! Hope you're better, thank you for your work on this blog! May I request a poll please?

Do you have a favourite book?

Yes (do tell in tags please!)

No

I never learned how to read

Do you have a favourite book?

Yes (do tell in tags please!)

no

I never learned how to read

results

Voting ended onMay 3

My fav is 1984 after i had it as a school lecture 🫪

[mellowtimes221]

Bloom For You 𑁍ࠬܓ

unfinished angsty asp art

[fruitybroom]

hey a separate peace tumblr do we fuck with me sharing my english assignment storyboard of the beach scene

[casgirl]

Characters who are like “let’s run away together let’s get away from all this” when it’s already too late!!!!!!!

[gene-eas]

Was John Knowles Married?

This question may seem like it should have a fairly easy answer, but it does not. Dear God does it not.

TL;DR: Almost certainly not. Also, never cite Wikipedia.

Let me explain how I got to that conclusion.

So this has bothered me for at least a year now: on Knowles' google info page, it says he was married to a women named Beth Anne Dyment Hughes from an unknown year to 2001 (presumably to his death, but perhaps she died earlier that year).

Huh. She was never mentioned in his New York Times obituary, but perhaps they didn't mention her because she didn't 'survive' him?

So I look up Beth Anne Dyment Hughes.

At the time of writing, there are only 9 matches on Google for the exact words "Beth Anne Dyment Hughes", one of which is just an ID lookup site.

The other 8 are from such reliable sources as Famous Birthdays, multiple Prezi presentations presumably made by high schoolers, someone's LiveJournal post, an eye-hurting Weebly site, and one reply on a site called MovieChat 14 years ago responding to someone saying Knowles never married.

So uh. I wasn't convinced.

Especially since this recent short biography of him, which goes into quite some detail about his life and cites multiple journal articles about him/ASP, does not mention a marriage. It's not an obituary, so you would think it would mention a wife even if she died before him.

But all these..."sources" cite the same specific name, and most of them also include that he married her at 19. So they must all be pulling from somewhere. But...where?

Where did this information come from??

This is the reason high school teachers told you not to cite Wikipedia.

The LiveJournal post, which dates to 2013, cites only one source: Wikipedia. So I decide to look through every edit ever made to Knowles' page to find where this marriage is mentioned, and hopefully finally find the actual source.

The earliest (dated) mention I can find of Beth Anne Dyment Hughes comes from this Wikipedia edit made on May 13th, 2009, by an IP user without an account (though one who made quite a few edits to not just Wikipedia in general, but Knowles' page specifically) - who I'll refer to as "The Editor" for clarity.

The text simply reads "He married Beth Anne Dyment Hughes at 19." No source is cited.

On October 29th, the t is removed from "Dyment", so now her name reads Beth Anne Dymen Hughes. This change seems to be intentional rather than a typo, as the rest of the sentence remains the same.

On November 2nd, his Early Life is expanded on using "offline Yale records". This could potentially point towards Knowles' marriage being mentioned in records I cannot access, but the editor says that the records regard "educational details" and nothing more is added to his marriage, so I don't think this is the case.

On December 8th, 2010, The Editor changes her name back to "Dyment".

On December 15th, as a result of vandalism, the page is reverted to the edit before Dyment was restored, so now her name is Dymen again.

On February 17th, 2011, The Editor changes her name back again to Dyment.

On April 2nd, Beth Anne Dyment Hughes is intentionally (i.e. not as a result of vandalism like previous removals) removed from the page for the first time.

On April 26th, The Editor makes an edit to the page stating that John Knowles' parents were "Brian Callaghan (BCAL the boss)" and Selena Gomez.

On May 5th, The Editor again edits the page, this time stating that John Knowles' dad is "Mark O'Brien, an AE muscle head". This is the last time The Editor interacts with Knowles' page. They did not add back Hughes.

On June 17th, user Lofty abyss adds Hughes back to the page. The wording is the same, and their edit is labeled "rvv" - I assume "revert vandalism" - so I think they believed that Hughes' removal was part of the vandalism?

On November 20th, 2012, someone changes the sentence to say "He did not marry Beth Anne Dyment Hughes at the age of 19". The edit is reversed by another user less than an hour later, but the edit comment labels it "good faith" (i.e. not vandalism).

On October 20th, 2013, her name is simplified to just "Beth Hughes".

On May 6th, 2015, Beth Hughes is removed from the page again. The page was undergoing copy-editing by multiple users at this time, so this may have been a result of the fact that in the previous 6 years, no source had ever been provided to corroborate her existence.

Beth Anne Dyment Hughes is never re-added. The Editor has not edited Wikipedia since 2013.

There is no "actual" source. There never has been.

So why did I tell you all that?

That not-brief history was provided to make two points:

For the six years that Beth Anne Dyment Hughes was stated to have been married to John Knowles, no source was ever provided.

The Editor has clearly vandalized John Knowles' page, particularly the section on his early life, at least two times.

The only person who seems to have had any knowledge about Beth Anne Dyment Hughes clearly had no qualms about adding nonsense to his article for shits and giggles.

There is absolutely no evidence that Beth Anne Dyment Hughes is any different.

If John Knowles ever married - and I cannot find any evidence that he did, and trust me I have looked - it was not to Beth Anne Dyment Hughes.

I cannot find any evidence that a woman by that name ever existed. Other than Knowles' google info box, there has been no mention of her anywhere online since she was removed from the Wikipedia page in May 2015.

[thereallennon]

kinda shitty sketches of finny and gene

[livvypages]

A Separate Peace, John Knowles

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Classics, historical fiction, coming-of-age | 208 pages | 1959

Summary:

Set at a boys boarding school in New England during the early years of World War II. Gene is a lonely, introverted intellectual. Phineas is a handsome, taunting, daredevil athlete. What happens between the two boyfriends one summer, like the war itself, banishes forever the innocence of these boys and their world.

“It seemed clear that wars were not made by generations and their special stupidities, but that wars were made instead by something ignorant in the human heart.”

My thoughts:

I went into this book without knowing anything beyond the fact that it’s an American classic, but more in the sense of “required reading at school at some point in time.” I couldn’t find much about it in mainstream media, and I noticed that this novel is often overshadowed by other coming-of-age classics that loom larger in the collective memory. All of this is to say I wasn’t expecting much but boy, did this knock me out of the park.

If I could have given this book 6 stars, I would. Not only do I love the clear, evocative prose, I was also immediately entranced by the idyllic setting and serene scholarly atmosphere, carefully balanced by a somber tone that fits the tragic narrative like a glove.

A Separate Peace captures with great nuance the uneasy transition from youth to adulthood, and the silent tragedy that can unfold between even the closest of friends. Knowles writes with aching precision about memory, guilt, and the loss of innocence—heightened by the oppressive stillness of an insulated school. Growing up there feels less like maturing and more like surviving, an experience that inevitably leads to the classic “trauma as a coming-of-age rite.”

What struck me most was how quietly violent this book is, illustrating how war can lurk around and sneak into the safest spaces. Gene and Finny’s bromance is fascinating, both a sanctuary and a battlefield: two boys suspended in a fragile peace, haunted by something darker waiting to claim them. Their connection is tender yet possessive, over the top but terrified of being understood. There’s a subtle homoeroticism there, mixing admiration, affection, envy and resentment. Their friendship is full of tension and longing—or was it actually love that never learned the right language to name itself?

Told as a flashback, this novel reads like a confession - nostalgic, mournful, and emotionally repressed. The prose is deceptively calm, every line deliberate and controlled. In my opinion, this book is an early embodiment of what we now call the dark academia aesthetic: the intimate yet claustrophobic beauty of classical education, the worship of intellect, the slow decay of fragile friendships beneath privilege and order. Before The Secret History, there was A Separate Peace - quieter, subtler, but cut from the same fabric.

[gratefulturbot]

i DON'T need them to kiss i need them to come to the sobering realisation that their souls are merged and no part of them is extricable from the other anymore

[mellowtimes221]

“The Winter Loves Me”

[c. 10.29.2025]

i made this for an october drawing prompt.

i’ve forgotten how impactful and significant this line is. i then remembered why i love Asp and it made me reread parts of it again and i teared up.

i owe a lot to this book and the community

[literatureluver]

Cuddlebugs

[my-own-private-house-in-nebraska]

g ene

[my-own-private-house-in-nebraska]

winter!!!! 🧣🧣🧣

[my-own-private-house-in-nebraska]

that scene from brokeback mountain except it’s asp