The diary of anne frank

407

It is again the afternoon in November 1945. The rooms are as we saw them in the first scene. MR. KRALER has joined MIEP and MR. FRANK. There are coffee cups on the table. We see a great change in MR. FRANK. He is calm now. His bitterness is gone. He slowly turns a few pages of the diary. They are blank.

[He picks up the diary again and turns the pages back to find a certain passage. As he finds it, we hear ANNE's voice.]

[MR. FRANK slowly closes the diary.]

The Diary of Anne Frank is considered their masterpiece. Before they wrote the play, the playwrights spent ten days in Amsterdam visiting the Secret Annex, studying the neighborhood, and questioning Otto Frank (who came from Switzerland to help) on his memories and impressions. It took them two years and eight drafts to complete the play, which opened on Broadway in 1955 to great acclaim. The play won a Pulitzer Prize in 1956 and has since been performed countless times in countries around the world.

In addition to her diary, Anne wrote many short stories and autobiographical sketches during her time in hiding. You'll find a selection of these in Anne Frank's Tales from the Secret Annex (Bantam).

Anne Frank Remembered (Simon & Schuster) is the story of Anne and the other occupants of the Secret Annex as told by their helper and protector Miep Gies.

409

... Since Saturday we've changed over, and have lunch at half past eleven in the mornings, so we have to last out with one cupful of porridge; this saves us a meal. Vegetables are still very difficult to obtain; we had rotten boiled lettuce this afternoon. Ordinary lettuce, spinach, and boiled lettuce, there's nothing else. With these we eat rotten potatoes, so it's a delicious combination!

As you can easily imagine, we often ask ourselves here despairingly: "What, oh, what is the use of the war? Why can't people live peacefully together? Why all this destruction?"

The question is very understandable, but no one has found a satisfactory answer to it so far. Yes, why do they make still more gigantic planes, still heavier bombs, and, at the same time, prefabricated houses for reconstruction? Why should millions be spent daily on the war and yet there's not a penny available for medical services, artists, or poor people?

Why do some people have to starve while there are surpluses rotting i other parts of the world? Oh, why are people so crazy?

I don't believe that the big men, the politicians and the capitalists alone, are guilty of the war. Oh no, the little man is just as guilty; otherwise the peoples of the world would have risen in revolt long ago! There's in people simply an urge to destroy, an urge to kill, to murder and rage, and until all mankind, without exception, undergoes a great change, wars will be waged everything that has been built up, cultivated, an grown will be destroyed and disfigured, after which mankind will have to begin all over again.

I have often been downcast, but never in despair; I regard our hiding as a dangerous adventure, romantic and interesting at the same time. In my diary I treat all the privations° as amusing. I have made up my mind now to lead a different life from other girls and, later on, different from ordinary housewives. My start has been so very full of

°privations: hardships.

410

I am young and I possess many buried qualities; I am young and strong and am living a great adventure; I am still in the midst of it and can't grumble the whole day long. I have been given a lot: a happy nature, a great deal of cheerfulness and strength. Every day I feel that I am developing inwardly, that the liberation is drawing nearer, and how beautiful nature is, how good the people are about me, how interesting this adventure is! Why, then, should I be in despair?

Yours,

Anne

Saturday, 15July, 1944

. . . "For in its innermost depths youth is lonelier than old age." I read this saying in some book and I've always remembered it, and found it to be true. Is it true, then, that grown-ups have a more difficult time here than we do? No. I know it isn't. Older people have formed their opinions about everything and don't waver before they act. It's twice as hard for us young ones to hold our ground and maintain our opinions in a time when all ideals are being shattered and destroyed, when people are showing their worst side and do not know whether to believe in truth and right and God.

Anyone who claims that the older ones have a more difficult time here certainly doesn't realize to what extent our problems weigh down on us, problems for which we are probably much too young but which thrust themselves upon us continually, until, after a long time, we think we've found a solution, but the solution doesn't seem able to resist the facts which reduce it to nothing again. That's the difficulty in these times: Ideals, dreams, and cherished hopes rise within us, only to meet the horrible truth and be shattered.

It's really a wonder that I haven't dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will destroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions, and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again.

In the meantime, I must uphold my ideals, for perhaps the time will come when I shall be able to carry them out. Yours,

411

a. Miep and Mr. Kraler's visit in Act Two, Scene I , sets off two conflicts: one over a cake, the other over a coat. Describe each conflict.

b. How does Anne and Peter's relationship change in Act Two, Scene I ? In Scene 2, how do Mrs. Frank and Mrs. Van Daan respond to this change?

c. At the beginning of Act Two, Scene 4, what is causing tension and fear in the household?

1. Do you agree with Anne that "people are really good at heart"? Does the play offer any evidence to support this statement?

2. In your opinion, is Mrs. Frank justified in demanding that the Van Daans leave the Secret Annex? (Why or why not?) What do you think would have happened if Miep hadn't come in with news of the invasion?

3. The climax of a play is its moment of greatest tension. What is this play's climax?

4. In Act One, Scene 4, Mr. Frank tells Anne, "You must build your own character" (page 376). Do you think she has succeeded in doing this by the end of the play? Explain.

5. On page 404, Anne says, "I want to go on living even after my death." Do you think her wish has come true? Explain.

6. What do you think is the main conflict in the play? Is it the conflict between the occupants of the Secret Annex and the Nazis, or is it something else?

7. Now that you have finished the play, think about the resources that accompany it-for example, Anne's diary entries, the historical photographs, the time line. Which resources did you find most helpful? Are there other resources you wish had been included? Explain your answers.

8. Before The Diary of Anne Frank was first performed, Otto Frank wrote in a letter to the actor who would portray him, "Please don't play me as a 'hero.' ... Nothing happened to me that did not happen to thousands upon thousands of other people." Do you see anyone in the play as a hero? What qualities or actions make someone a hero?

Challenging the Text

9. There is no evidence in Anne's diary that Mr. Van Daan stole food; the playwrights may have invented this incident for dramatic effect. What do you think of such changes in fiction or drama that is based on real events?

412

Whenever you compare two people or things, you tell how they're alike. When you contrast them, you point out their differences. Choose any two characters in this play who have at least one thing in common (the two sisters, for instance, or the two mothers or fathers). Think about how they're alike and different, and jot down your ideas in a Venn diagram like the one begun at right. List the ways your characters are alike where the circles overlap.

The stage set shown on page 341 is just one possible design. Using the stage directions on page 348, make a diorama of a stage set for the play. Remember that all action taking place onstage must be visible from every point in the audience.

Creative Writing

3, “I Am” Anne

Write an "I Am" poem for Anne Frank, using this framework:

I am...

I see...

I cry...

I am...

I try...

I am...

A tragedy is a serious play in which the main character meets with failure or death. The main character in a tragedy, however, is admirable and very self aware. When this character is defeated, we feel horror and sadness, but we also feel triumphant because something good has appeared in our world.

There are several types of tragedy. One type involves "the destruction of innocence." In this kind of tragedy the hero is not responsible for his or her disaster. We feel great pity at the loss of this hero because an innocent person is destroyed by cruel outside forces. Does this play about Anne Frank meet these criteria for a tragedy? Write your answer in a brief essay. Be sure to cite details from the play in your response.

(continued on next page)

413

How do you think Anne would feel about the fact that her diary has been read by millions of strangers? What influence has the diary had that might justify Mr. Frank's decision to have it published? With a partner, role-play a dialogue between Anne and her father about the publication of the diary.

Much of the play is based on accounts of conversations and events that Anne Frank recorded in her diary. As a result, the play reflects her point of view. From the point of view of one of the other occupants of the Secret Annex, write a diary entry describing an event in the play as that character saw it. (In fact, Margot Frank also kept a diary during their time in hiding, but it was lost.)

Make a storyboard of the play. Divide a large sheet of paper into six equal sections by drawing two lines down and one across. Choose what you think are the six most important events in the play. In each section of the paper, draw an illustration of one of the events on your list. Share your storyboard with your classmates, explaining why you chose the six events you did.

Reread the excerpts from Anne Frank's diary (see pages 342-343 and Connections on pages 410-411). Based on these entries, do you feel that the play captures the "real Anne," or do you think important aspects of her personality are missing from the character in the play? Write one or two paragraphs in which you clearly state your opinion on the question. Cite evidence from the play or the diary entries to support your opinion.

With a group of classmates, rehearse and perform a scene or part of a scene from the play. Here are some questions to consider:

• How many characters appear in this scene?

• What props will you need? (Read the dialogue and stage directions closely to find out.)

• What offstage sound effects will be heard, and how will you produce them?

Research/Social Studies

10. Past and Present

How does the Holocaust continue to affect the world today? Using the Internet and print sources in a library, research one of the following topics or another topic of your choice:

• the work of the Anne Frank Foundation

• the creation of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C.

Present what you have learned to your class.

414

Each of the following sentences contains a dangling or misplaced modifier. Rewrite each sentence so that it makes sense.

1. Anne watched the canal boats hiding in the Secret Annex.

2. Coughing and sneezing, Peter's cat was a problem for Dussel.

3. Hoping for a better future, the cake read "Peace in 1944."

4. Miep discovered the diary in the Secret Annex, which had been thrown on the floor.

A modifying phrase or clause that doesn't clearly modify a word in a sentence is called a dangling modifier.

DANGLING

Peeking out the window, the church tower could be seen.

The church tower isn't peeking out the window. Rearranging and adding or changing words in the sentence can make the meaning clear.

CLEAR

Peeking out the window, Anne could see the church tower.

A misplaced modifier causes confusion because it seems to modify the wrong word in a sentence.

MISPLACED

My grandmother told me about her experiences in Nazi-occupied Europe last week.

CLEAR

My grandmother told me last week about her experiences in Nazi-occupied Europe.

Divide the list of words in the Word Bank with two classmates. Write down your five words; then, match each one with the name of a character or an event you think Anne might apply the word to in her diary. Read your list of characters and events to your partners, and have them guess which of your vocabulary words goes with each item on the list.