As the weeks grow into months, the little group in the “Secret Annexe” has, as might be expected, its ups and downs, quarreling with one another and incessantly criticizing its youngest member, the spirited Anne (who often cries at night because of the group’s irritable remarks). The members of the group also talk about their respective childhoods and occasionally laugh at funny remarks made—whether intentionally or not—by one or another of their number. The fact that the building in which they are hiding and which serves as offices is being sold to a new owner (the offices were only leased from the former owner) gives the group some cause for alarm, but the problem is finally overcome.
And then more tedium sets in again, and as a diversion Anne and Margot are given card index boxes so that they can keep an account of the books they have read; Anne is also given a little notebook for foreign words she masters. Butter and margarine are distributed carefully and in rationed quantities to each person. At one point, Anne writes, “Lately Mummy and I have been getting on better together, but we still never confide in each other” (February 27, 1943). It is sometimes painful to read these intimate confessions.
On March 10, 1943, Anne mentions the bombing of Amsterdam by the planes of the Allies and the firing of the anti-aircraft guns, which disturb their sleep almost every night while they are in hiding. Although Anne knows that it is childish, she always creeps into her father’s bed for comfort, unable to overcome her fears by herself.
The news from the outside world continues to raise—and then dash—the hopes of the group. On March 18, 1943, Anne writes excitedly that Turkey has entered the war, but the next day, it is announced that this is not, in fact, the case. Anne also describes a visit made by Hitler to wounded soldiers, a visit which is broadcast over the radio. She remarks, “Listening in to it was pitiful. . . . One of them [the wounded] felt so moved at being able to shake hands with the Führer (that is, if he still had a hand!) that he could hardly get the words out of his mouth” (March 19, 1943).
Because of the circumstances of being in strict hiding during the midst of the outside world’s “ordinary life,” every small noise or sudden suspicion of being discovered is a cause for serious alarm for the group. Although the men of the group try to be chivalrous and protect the women from becoming so anxious, it is not always possible. Since the group is in the habit of using the offices downstairs in order to listen to the radio there, or go to the bathroom after the office and warehouse staff have gone home, they are more exposed to being discovered than if they had remained in their hiding place, behind the false bookcase, all the time. Whether or not the alarms and fears of a burglary which they occasionally experience are genuine or imagined, real terror is struck into the hearts of everyone, causing them all to cower in dread, trying to keep quiet. Anne recounts the effect which this has on them all and how none of them can sleep afterward because they are so afraid (March 25, 1943).
After Anne confides to her diary, in a rather contemptuous way, about the real (or imagined) sickness of Mr. Van Daan, she changes the tone of her diary entry, giving the essence of a speech made by one of the German leaders in the Netherlands, declaring that the Nazis have decreed that a new objective within Holland will soon be “cleaning out” the various Dutch provinces of Jews. Anne notes that the terms which the “German big shots” use are reminiscent of those employed in getting rid of cockroaches, and then she revealingly remarks, “These wretched people are sent to filthy slaughterhouses like a herd of sick, neglected cattle. But I won’t talk about it, I only get nightmares from such thoughts” (March 27, 1942).
Once again, the topic of Anne’s relationship with her parents is discussed in her diary. She has unintentionally hurt her mother’s feelings by refusing to say her prayers with her (because Anne’s father cannot do so that night). Anne tries to reason with herself, feeling sorry for her mother, yet she refuses to apologize for saying what she considered to be the truth at the time about how she felt. Anne states quite clearly that her mother has alienated her with her “tactless remarks and crude jokes, which I don’t find at all funny” (April 2, 1943). Later, that same month, Anne lists her quarrels with her mother as just one of the various clashes going on amongst all the members of the group, adding that “everyone is angry with everyone else” (April 27, 1943). At that time, the Allied air raids were increasing in intensity, and Anne writes, “We don’t have a single quiet night. I’ve got dark rings under my eyes from lack of sleep.” In addition, the shortage of food is beginning to be even more acute although in her following entry (May 1, 1943), Anne reminds herself: “. . . it is a paradise compared with how other Jews who are not in hiding must be living.”
Nevertheless, despite her realization that their situation is better than that of many other Jews, Anne is horrified by the drastic decline of their own standards. The comfortable life which they had lived beforehand, and even, to some extent, in the “Secret Annexe” has declined rapidly. Their former life contrasts starkly with the privations which they are suffering now, ranging from a lack of food, to the inability to change their sheets, or even to renew their diminishing stock of underwear. The nightly air raids continue, and Anne prepares a suitcase with the basic things she would need if she had to escape, though she realizes, at her mother’s prompting, that there would be nowhere for her to escape to—absolutely nowhere.
The last entry before Anne’s fourteenth birthday contains news from the outside world relating to an air battle between German and British planes. The group also learns about strict new regulations concerning Dutch university students which have been imposed by the Nazis. Anne also mentions the fact that the group in the “Secret Annexe” must burn its vegetable peelings and refuse every other day, even though the weather is quite warm, because they must not put anything in the garbage pails for fear that even this might lead to their discovery. She remarks: “How easily one could be betrayed by being a little careless!” (May 18, 1943). This innocent remark is bitterly ironic in view of the group’s eventual fate.
The air raids continue to be as frightening as usual, but Anne and the others find relief in nervous laughter at the comical remarks of Mr. Düssel, especially when Mrs. Van Daan goes downstairs to Mr. Düssel’s room, “. . . seeking there the rest which she could not find with her spouse,” and Düssel receives her with the words, “Come into my bed, my child!”
Anne remarks, “This sent us off into uncontrollable laughter. The gunfire troubled us no longer, our fear was banished!” (May 18, 1943).
This first year of Anne’s diary has been eventful, to put it mildly. From being a normal Dutch girl going to school and having fun with her’ friends, she has been forced to go into hiding and to be shut up with another seven individuals, unable to go outside, and live as other youngsters do. Apart from the problems which she experiences in her relations with her mother and her sister—problems which are fairly normal for any adolescent—she is also obliged to contend with the problems of being confined in a rather small area with a group of people who generally irritate and annoy her.
In addition to the difficulties of coping with her emotions and the changes in her body—another normal feature of adolescence—Anne has had to come to terms with the privations, the crowded and unsanitary conditions and—most especially—with the ever-constant fear of being discovered and hauled away to one of the Nazi death camps.
The voice of the somewhat spoiled young girl who begins the diary changes by the end of this first year to the voice of a young girl who is able to analyze situations and characters, find amusement rather than annoyance in the little incidents of daily life, and put them all down on paper in a vivid, graphic way. She decidedly has a way with words, and her delicate irony, the way she records conversations, and her ability to describe scenes all enable us to experience and see and feel what she herself is undergoing.
