The economy was not doing well, soldiers were coming home with horrible PTSD and after-shock, the great depression was going on, etc. :)
Wealth with concentrated among few families.
Yes, at the beginning we are shown that they aren’t quite exactly comfortable with each other and they annoy each other kinda like they dislike one another but as we move on we are shown that Anne in a way likes Peter and Peter does too. They would still annoy each other but would feel a lot more comfortable around each other that even Anne wanted to help feed Peters cat as it’s known she herself had a cat as well
