Obasan
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One: June 12 to July 8, 1942
Summary:
The first entry of the diary is on June 12, Annes thirteenth birthday. She tells the story of how she woke early and then had to contain herself until seven a.m. to wake her parents and open her presents. She claims that the diary, one of those presents, is “possibly the nicest of all.” She relates her list of presents, adding that she is “thoroughly spoiled,” and then goes off to school with her friend Lies. On Sunday she has a birthday party with her school friends. Her mother always asks who she is going to marry, and she has managed to dissuade her from the boy she really likes, Peter Wessel. She talks about her school friends: Lies Goosens, Sanne Houtman, and Jopie de Waal. Lies and Sanne used to be her best friends, but since she started attending the Jewish Secondary School, she has become closer to Jopie.
On Saturday, June 20, Anne divulges that she wants her diary to be a friend to her–unlike her other friends, someone she can completely confide to. Although she has a loving family and lots of friends, she feels isolated and alone sometimes, . So she will call her diary “Kitty” and address it like a friend. She tells Kitty the history of her family: her parents marriage, her 1929 birth in Frankfurt, and then, “as we are Jewish,” their 1933 emigration to Holland. The rest of her family suffered under Hitlers pogroms in Germany; some of them managed to emigrate to other countries.
Harry comes to meet her parents, and Anne makes all sorts of preparations for his visit. They go out for a walk, and Harry brings Anne home ten minutes after eight oclock. As Jews have a city-wide curfew of eight oclock, Mr. Frank is very upset and makes Anne promise to be back in the house at ten minutes to eight from now on. Still, her family likes Harry, and Anne does as well. ” Her father tells her the disturbing news that he has been planning for them to go into hiding for more than a year. Anne is horrified and asks why must he talk like that. He replies that he and Mrs. Frank will take care of it all and there is no need for her to be upset.
Analysis
In the beginning part of her diary, we meet Anne before her ordeal. The picture we get is of a typical thirteen-year-old: precocious in some ways (her analysis of her friendships is s If she had been allowed to continue living outside and going to school, interacting with others, or if the war had not targeted Jews, she would have continued to be a charming, if faceless young girl. But as we will see, the change of location will change Anne.
. In many ways she shows how the average human being responds to repression .
Anne Frank was a youg girl who despite
her adversities during Nazi occupation managed to live a young girls childhood of friends, school and boys. Even during occupation, Anne lived for the most part a normal childhood. The one thing that did change was that she had to leave Montessori school and attend an all Jewish school.
When Annes older sister, sixteen year old Margot was summond into deportation, the family went into hiding. For the next two years the family lived in a “secret annex” joined by the Van Danne family and an elderly dentist named Albert Druzzel. Anne had to be quiet during the day and mover by night. This was a time of hardship for Anne. Poor food, no going outdoors and the tensions that arise from living in close quarters with others.
In 1944, the family was found and sent to Auzwich in Poland. They were on of the last families to be sent the a concentration camp. This was the last time that Otto Frank would see his family. In October of 1944, Anne, Margot and Mrs. Van Danne were sent to Belsen camp in Germany. Unlike Auswitz, that reigned terror over the prisoners, Belsen was disheavled, had poor food and sanitation conditions and typhus ran rampant. The prisoners were starving and although the allies were winning there was very little hope for the prisoners of Belson. While in Belsen Anne met her childhood friend Lies Goosens. They talked and discovered that they were not different from each other. Their lives ran together on the same parralel. They lives were to take the same fate.
Annes sister Margot died around February 1945. Anne died a few days after her sister at the age of 16. Otto Frank having survived the war, returned home and some Dutch friends gave him Anne Franks Diary that she had been writing in her youth. It had been stiil in the secret annex where they lived for two years. Her book was published in Holland as a memorial and has since been translated into Thirty One Languages.
Annes book was written during 1942-1944. At this time Hitler believed that Germans were the pure race and Jews were among the most vile and disgusting people he knew.Hitler believed that Jew were vile and had them killed or sent to concentration camps. It was in this climate that Anne grew up while keeping her eyes on the great good and believeing that man was actually good.
An importantpoint in Annes diary shows that it was written during her adolescent years, no different than of the youth of today. She was questioning her sexuality, trying to find space to be alone from adult questions and trying to find her own identity. Living in a confined space made it doubly hard. Throughout her diary she constantly questions herself and tries to find out what kind of person she is. She worries over the fate of her friends and tries to be the person she feels her parents want her to be. Towards the end of her diary she arrives of the conclusion that she is not all that others want her to be, but that is okay because she is a good person and respects herself. This is something that the youth of today try to come to grips with.
Annes quest for identity and coming of age are the main themes for this diary. Anne constantly questions what kind of person she is, should she hate her persecutrers, are they right in saying that she is nothing because she is a Jew. She must sort through her questions and answers and arrive at who and what she believes is a good person. All youth suffer from an identity crisis. It is exaerbated by the fact that teens are easily influenced, peer presurre is high, and there