Student Question
Do Peter and Anne have normal teenage relationships with their parents in The Diary of a Young Girl?
Quick answer:
Peter and Anne do seem to have normal teenage relationships with their parents. They have arguments, want space, and have fun together, but these experiences are all somewhat heightened due to their confinement.
In many ways, both Peter and Anne seem to have normal teenage relationships with their parents. They have conflicts, as both are on the verge of becoming young adults and believe their parents are overprotective and lack understanding, but this would seem consistent with the way many other teenagers view their parents.
However, Peter and Anne are very different from other teenagers. They are in hiding from the Nazis and many of the concerns that their parents feel are real concerns regarding their physical safety. Moreover, in most parent-teen situations, parents go to work and teens go to school, and the family gets a respite from being together. Peter and Anne are confined to their attic because it would be dangerous for them to leave, so they live in extremely close proximity to their parents and have no real breaks from one another.
The fear they feel all the time...
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also exacerbates the tensions between the teens and their parents. Anne writes:
I was so scared someone might hear it that I literally begged Father to take me back upstairs. Mother understood my anxiety and went with me. Whatever we do, we're very afraid the neighbors might hear or see us.
Anne’s relationship with her father is closer than her relationship with her mother, which is not that unusual. Anne believes that her mother treats Margot differently, which is sibling rivalry that many teens feel. Yet, she says,
Daddy is always nice to me, and he also understands me much better. At moments like these I can't stand Mother.
While that might be more extreme than how other teens would describe feelings about a parent, it is not that different. Ironically, in some ways, Anne’s conflicts with her mother might reflect personality traits that they share. In fact, Mrs. Frank tells Mrs. van Daan,
Well, Mrs. van Daan, I agree that it's much better if a person isn't overmodest. My husband, Margot and Peter are all exceptionally modest. Your husband, Anne and I, though not exactly the opposite, don't let ourselves be pushed around.
If their lives had not been cut short, Anne and her mother might have come to understand one another much better as Anne got older. Peter has to deal with the same issues, but even so, seems to have a fairly open relationship with his parents. He even tells Anne that he will ask his parents questions about the differences between male and female cats:
Why wait? I'll ask my parents. They know more than I do and they've had more experience.