During WW2, Anne’s family has to go into hiding. While Anne is living in the Secret Annex, she clings herself to certain objects, one of them being her diary in which she accounts the major and minor events (little did she know it) leading up to her death.

Anne’s diary was a gift to her on her last birthday before she and her family went into hiding. This is one of the few things that enable here to maintain a certain level privacy while living the Annex with several other people (literally). Anne writes on the first page of her diary “I hope I will be able to confide everything to you, as I have never been able to confide in anyone, and. I hope you will be a great source of comfort and support.” Anne literally sacrifices her life in order to keep her diary. After multiple break-ins in thee building that hides the Secret Annex, the diary becomes a threat to everyone’s existence if thee police find it because the diary hold secret information.

Another symbol in this book is the Star of David. The Star of David is a religious symbol of the Jewish faith, but during the Holocaust this star was used against thee Jews. They were forced to wear a yellow Star of David to identify them as Jews, or those whose rights had been revoked. On page 8 of her diary, Anne states “Our freedom was severely restricted by a series of anti-Jewish decrees: Jews were required to wear a yellow star”. That star meant giving up bicycles and cars, assigning strict curfews, and forbidding access to movies, swimming pools, and athletic events. Jews were required to do their shopping between 3 and 5pm. They were also forced to go to only Jewish barbershops and beauty parlors. Jews were forbidden to be out between 8pm and 6am. Jews were forbidden to attend theaters, movies, or any other forms of entertainment. Jews and Christians were segregated in schools and their homes. The yellow Star of David became a symbol of religious oppression.

One last symbol in Anne’s diary are ration coupons. They symbolize sustenance and greed. During the war there was no enough food to feed the soldiers and the citizens, so the government Gove out ration coupons were given too people to approve them to buy a certain amount of food so that a person/family would not exceed their fair share. Only citizens got the ration coupons so when the Franks went into hiding, they stooped received the coupons. On page 65 of her diary, Anne writes, ” We also purchased ration books on the black market. The price keeps going up; it’s already risen from 27 to 33 guilders. And that for mere sheets of printed paper!” Without the ration coupons they would starve to death. Things that were considered valuable before the war were sold off to buy ration coupons, and the price of the coupons continued to rise because of high demand. That ration coupons themselves symbolized sustenance, but het fact that the price of them only raised (and drastically) symbolized the greed of those selling the coupons and other goods.