Anne Frank Essay, Research Paper

Diary of Anne Frank

The story Diary of Anne Frank was a very interesting book which showed the ways a group of Jewish people during the 1940’s went about trying to conceal their identity and themselves. This story was a true story taken from a diary of a young girl during the incident. This was made into a play during 1955. This was praised as Frances Goodrich’s and her husband Albert Hackett’s most famous work as it was performed.

The play was started in November of 1945. As Mr. Frank began to read the diary, it flashed back to July 1942 in an attic in Amsterdam because this was where the people were hiding and represented the type of place that Jews all over were living. The most important part of the play were the people who were acted out. They gave the play a sense of flavor and realism. Anne, a young German girl was particularly amusing because of the scuffles she and everyone around her seemed to have. Anne’s Mother was a woman who was more traditional than anything else and wanted Anne to be more like a lady. One such person was Margot. As Anne’s sister, she was very nice and didn’t speak out and was very proper. The Frank’s weren’t the only ones in this attic, there were other people such as the Van Daans. Mr. Frank let them stay because they needed a place to hide and since they had helped him out so much in the past by actually teaching Mr. Frank German, he felt it was the least he could do. The Van Daans had a son which Anne later became interested in. Peter was the only person who Anne could understand and knew that Anne could understand him. They could both talk to each other freely when they were together. Dussel soon joined the group. He was only supposed to be up in the attic for a short time, but he ended up staying till the end. He had to leave his Dentistry to hide out from the Germans. These people would not of lasted too long without the help of Miep Gies and Mr. Kraler who gave them the necessities they needed to survive up in the attic for so long. All these people gave their own personality and views to add new dimensions to the play and make it more enjoyable. They all were believable by their realism and how they acted to certain situations.

The play was about the conflicts and struggles two families living together for a long period of time seemed to get a bit crazy. In general, they were hiding from the Nazi’s. During their hiding out, Anne and Peter soon found a friendship between each other and started talking building up a relationship after about 2 years of nothing. This story was a prime example of what tons of families and different people had to live through during these hard times. The play demonstrated it the way it was as people who are nice and happy at the beginning and start to crumble as the years go by. Mr. Van Daan crumbled because he started stealing food while he knew his own son was close to starving.

I thought this was a very interesting play about several groups of people and how they were able to survive up in the attic for about 4 years in the attic with almost only themselves. I think this is a good book for people who like suspense as in if Anne and everyone else gets caught ultimately in the end of the play. It also would be good for someone who was learning how Jews lived during the 1940’s with the Germans as a threat to their freedom.