The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank

The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank


                Anne Frank lived in hiding for twenty five months in a “Secret Annexe” above an office building. She was a Jewish girl living in Amsterdam with her father, mother and older sister, who received a diary for her thirteenth birthday in 1942. Shortly after her family went into hiding with the Van Daan family, who was also Jewish. There were eight people in all living in the Secret Annexe after the addition of Dussel, an elderly Jewish dentist. With the help of Anne’s father, Otto Frank’s associates they lived successfully in hiding for twenty five months before they were found. Anne’s diary was recovered by her father, the only survivor in the family and later published.
                The one thing that you must keep in mind when beginning The Diary of a Young Girl is that this literally is a teenager’s diary and was not meant to be a literary work. This is where a young woman poured her heart and soul out for a little more than two years. All of her fears, notions, wonderings and desires were placed in this diary and was never meant to be shared. Anne tossed around the notion of one day using this diary to aid in writing but never explicitly said she would publish it. What’s funny is that this is very well written. For a teenage girl she did and incredible job of expressing herself in written form. Anne said more than once that she wanted to be a writer and she “wanted to go on living after my death.” She has.

                Knowing the entire time while reading this book that she was never able to live beyond the war was a stark and detrimental reality. Anne’s youth shone through the pages in the most amazing way. Here we have a teenage girl who is not only experiencing becoming a woman but she is in fear for her life and hiding and yet she lives. It was so incredible to realize while reading this diary that life has to move on. Even when you are afraid, even when there is a war, even when you are falling in love, even when the raid sirens are blaring, life must go on and it did in that “Secret Annexe” for Anne and the rest of the people hiding. Some of her writings are so trivial and so meaningless and so honest because what thirteen or fourteen year old girl doesn’t ponder on trivial matters. Yet she matures over the twenty five months into a young woman well beyond her years, who self reflects on the path and looks forward to a future without war where she can attend school, become a journalist and travel the world. Those things didn’t happen for her and yet her story lives on. I am affected and moved by this diary in a way that I hadn’t imagined. For that reason I have to give Anne’s diary 5 out of 5 stars. These are the stories we need to share and we need to read. 

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