Today, the kind of snow day that keeps you inside most of the day, posed the perfect opportunity to look through that evil yet friendly and HUGE stack of favorite books that have somehow only been picked up once.
I have owned The Diary of Anne Frank for the longest time, and read it for the first time- and only time so far- two summers ago. I flipped through it, rereading a few parts and remembering how I might have analyzed Anne Frank as a character and person at that time.
Anne Frank's story has moved and touched a huge audience, and people from all over have devoured entryafter entry of hers.
Here's my view: Her journal survived the war, and ended up being published. That is amazing. But Anne Frank herself wasn't the most remarkable girl.
No offense intended, Anne. The girl was clever, gifted with the pen, and experienced horrible, intense things that she managed to convey decades later to the world, once she was gone. But so many others- millions- experienced what she did. When we read her diary, the immediate reaction with so many people is to start thnking about her. Picking apart her emotions, what kept her strong, etc.
What Frank does do is symbolize the population of Jews in World War Two that were terrorized and brutally mistreated (and that's an understatement, believe me) and killed by Nazis. Her face shines in the millions because of what she brought out from those horrors, even though she finished in a camp like any other that was unfortunate (another extreme understatement) enough to have to live and die through this.
There's a little bit of her in you when you finish it- she manages to draw the reader in and you experience everything alongside Anne. And there's already a little bit of her in us, because we're all human, just like Anne Frank- we feel, we breath, and we live- no matter how long or short a time period.
And when you close the book, you realize it's not over. So much more happened after that...so much more of her life.
But you have to be content with what you do know.
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Wow, your old uncle in California is impressed with your somewhat unconventional take on Anne Frank. You make good points - how many other people experienced what she did, or worse, but their sentiments were never memorialized. Got me thinking.....
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