At the end of Act II, Scene 1 of The Diary of Anne Frank, Anne confides in Peter. How do you think Anne feels after this convers
ation? To whom do you talk about your problems? What qualities does that person possess that makes you go to that person? Answer these questions in your journal in a response of AT LEAST 150 WORDS, using details from the text to support your ideas as needed. Below is act two scene one Scene 1 This scene starts on January first in 1944. They have been hiding for one year, five months and twenty-five days. Anne is writing in her diary while everyone else is either reading, lying down, or taking the laundry down (Mrs. Frank.) Anne says that everyone is now a little thinner. She also says Mr. and Mrs. Van Daan discussions are as violent as ever and her Mom still doesn’t understand her, while she doesn’t understand her Mom either. Miep comes with Mr. Kraler as the doorbell rings with the V is for Victory signal, which means “V” in Morse code. They tell everyone “Happy New Year,” and Miep brings a cake just like she did the year before. Mr. and Mrs. Van Daan fight over who should cut the cake. Eventually Mrs. Frank gets the knife to cut it. Peter asks if Miep can look for his cat Mouschi. She has to go because Dirk is taking her to a party. Mr. Van Daan chases after her and he wants to sell Mrs. Van Daan’s fur coat. Mrs. Van Daan begins to cry after Mr. Van Daan pulled the coat away from her. Mr. Kraler asks Mr. Frank to come downstairs with him to gets his opinion on something. Mr. Frank makes Mr. Kraler tell everyone what he has to say. He tells them that works in the storeroom named Carl asked a few weeks before Mr. Kraler is telling them this, about how Mr. Frank was and Mr. Kraler said he heard a rumor that he was in Switzerland. Carl thought Mr. Kraler knew more. The day before Mr. Kraler asked this, Carl came with invoices for Mr. Kraler to sign and when he looked up he saw Carl staring at the bookcase. He asked if there was a door there that went up to a loft and he also wanted Twenty more guilders (money in Holland) a week. Dussel thinks that Carl was the thief and that’s how he knows about it. They tell him to offer Carl half of the raise and he agrees. He goes downstairs to get the phone and it’s his wife calling. Margot says she wishes the end will come, whatever it is and Mrs. Frank says she should be ashamed of herself. Anne goes to her room and slams the door. Peter brings Anne’s cake to her room and she thanks him. Peter says he thinks Anne was fine with what she said and he can’t talk when he’s mad. He says she’s fine and without her he doesn’t know what he’ll do. Anne and Peter talk for a little while and they feel comfortable talking with each other. The scene ends with a diary entry by Anne. She says that the people Miep got ration books (books of stamps given to ensure even distribution of scarce items) for them were arrested, so they had to cut down on their food. On March 6th 1944, Mr. Kraler is in the hospital and he probably has an ulcer (an open painful wound that fails to heal.) Miep has to run the business and help the families by herself. The Americans have landed in Italy and Mr. Frank is hoping for the war to end soon. Mr. Dussel is waiting for Carl to ask for more money. She really wants someone to talk to that understands her that is young and feels like she does.
Anne Frank has had all of these negative feelings bottled up in her, and she never expressed this. So finally she couldn't hold in her negative emotions, and which lead to her exploding her emotions to her mom. She is angry being a teenager in the war and blames all of this on the grownups. So when she finally explodes she takes it out on her mom and simply needs to calm down and talk. With her outburst peter becomes in awe of her "sticking it to the man." To which he agrees with her about the whole situation, with them both becoming unlikely allies. Having talked to peter she realized that all she needed to do was simply communicate with someone. At the end of the scene, they become close and both agree if they ever need to talk they can talk to each other. With this, I think Anne feels like a weight lifted off her shoulder because she finally let go and talked about her feelings. I personally like to talk to my friends whenever I'm feeling negative about a certain situation. The reason for this is because my friends are understanding but still straight forward, they are not afraid to tell me when I'm wrong. They don't beat around the bush with me and, this is something I appreciate, I always want to be real with myself.
The phrase from the excerpt that suggests that Krogstad is prone to engage in crime and may, in fact, be a criminal is the following one: diseased moral character It is the only option that talks about somebody being a bad person, which is what Krogstad is. The other options do not show that moral ambiguity this option does.
