Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl Mass Market Paperback – June 1, 1993

I first read this book (the edited down version) when I was nine years old, I received the book as a gift, and again when I was twelve for school. I recently re-read the book (the new un-edited version) and coming from an entirely different perspective now that I am a thirty year old mother.

First, I want to say that I absolutely believe that this book should still be included in school curriculum. The only thing 'new' about it is that pages and passages were added. Nothing was taken out and the translation was not changed. Reports that the book is so different that it's nothing like the original are false. Reports that the story is different are false.

There is no reason for the edited version to still be used because children read Anne Frank's diary around ages 11-14 years old which was around age when Anne herself was writing the diary. Anything that could be seen as supposedly "inappropriate" can be seen on daytime television with a PG or maybe PG-13 rating. Especially these days, there's definitely nothing in there that is beyond the norm for the average tween-teen. I think that continuing to use an edited version is insulting to Anne Frank's memory. Not only that, but it provides valuable information about the time period and gives more relateability to the diary.

The passages which are included in the new version are not anything that the average 8-12 year old girl does not already know about her own body and the "birds and the bees", and are so few and short that they comprise a tiny percentage of the work itself. The romance between herself and Peter is very chaste and nothing untoward happens in the story. (Spoiler: they hold hands and a kiss a few times. that's it.) The passages that some see as inappropriate are not at all titillating, a medical textbook is more erotic. Coming from a mom's point of view, I would definitely allow my daughter to read the unedited book.

I think this should stay on school book lists because some kids these days see the Holocaust as something that happened a long time ago that is meaningless now, without realizing that genocides and racial motivated violence still happens every day. I think it seems to them like just another thing they have to learn about along with The Hundred Years War and the Crusades.

Anne Frank's diary gives kids perspective and helps makes the tragic loss of life during WWII a tangible thing they can understand. The diary is so relate-able and reflects so many feelings that all teens have had, that she becomes three dimensional to them and no longer a just some person that died a long time ago. This sensitivity towards the loss of a life is what we need now in the times we live in.

As we read the diary we see how much potential was lost not only in Anne but in her entire family. Anne Frank was an intelligent and well-read young woman who studied multiple languages and had an analytical mind. I believe we lost a shining beacon of women's intelligence when she died. She was an emerging feminist, activist, and writer! I think she would have been an amazing woman who would have gone on to do great things. All that potential was lost millions of times over during WWII, and this is what we feel deep in our hearts upon closing the book.

Most of the book is about the privations and hardship of living hidden away in the "annex". There is very little coverage of the violence of the times or much that is going on in the outside world because they had little knowledge of it since they were hidden. I think this is partly why some schoolchildren report the diary is boring. It does get repetitive at times, which reflects the feelings of those living in hiding. They had to wait and wait in fear, not knowing what the next day would bring.

There are many self-reflective passages where Anne laments being picked on by the adults in the annex, wondering if she will live up to the expectations they have for her, hoping she can reach her goals. There is a thread of hope apparent even in her most depressing writings. I think these are the parts I think teens find most relate-able because all teens want to achieve things, please their parents, and find hope in their moments of despair.

Toward the end of the diary we see just how difficult things have become for the family which is not always accurately represented in the movie versions of the diary. They were starving, never full at meals, and having to exist off moldy and tasteless food. There was one bathroom for eight people and at times the toilet could not be flushed. They had threadbare, holey clothing which was too small. The cat used the bathroom wherever it wanted towards the end, and their helpers came less and less frequently as circumstances got worse and worse. Their conditions deteriorated in ways that children living in the comfort of the 21st century could never imagine. It's so important for kids to read about these conditions and contrast them with their own in order to not only feel grateful but to feel sympathy for those who lived in these terrible times.

The Kindle version had fairly large print and worked just fine on my phone and tablet with no issues. The new version has a new introduction and I believe the epilogue has changed a bit as well. I enjoyed the footnotes feature which allows you to touch the number which takes you to the footnotes page, then when you touch the number again it takes you back to the page you were originally on. I had no problems purchasing or downloading.

If you want to know more about what happened to Anne Frank after the diary, there is a book called "The Last Seven Months of Anne Frank" by Willy Lindwer which includes stories from people who met her in the camps.

Another recommendation is the author Eva Schloss who was Anne Frank's stepsister, who wrote about surviving Auschwitz.

Same edition as the one I have read from my local library. This appears to be as fine an edition as you can get, and I have done a fair amount of research on that. This, the "definitive edition" has a lot of material that did not appear in the original one that was edited by Anne's father after the war. It also is on superior paper, with very readable type, and the photos are clearly rendered, compared to the other editions I have had in hand.

Wonderful book, the like of which I haven't seen elsewhere. So many wonderful passages, insights into life such as you rarely find anywhere. Anne's ruminations captured here were for herself, from the heart. Writing this helped so much in making her life tolerable during this very difficult period in her life. Toward the end, I found it difficult to plow to the end, knowing that she tragically did not survive. However, she was unaware that their arrest was imminent, so the unfortunate ending is not implicit in Anne's writing. She just may as well have survived and gone on to have the wonderful life and career she very much deserved. I have read a lot about WW II, but this book succeeded in doing what all the other readings did not for me -- it made me feel that I was living through it myself.

This book was fascinating. I was a little surprised that there wasn't more about the atrocities that were happening around them instead of all the turmoil in the household. However, I realize that she was just a very young girl. And, I was surprised about how sexually aware she was. Until she and her family went into hiding, she hadn't had a lot of worldly awareness so she wrote about what was happening around her, and that was everything that went on in that household with those people. It would be hard to imagine how I or any other person would react under the same circumstances. I tried to imagine what it would be like to have to be totally quiet...not to be able to even move around at all for several hours or not be able to use the bathroom when you needed to. I thought what would happen if you had a cold, and were coughing. How could you control it? After she would write about her feelings when certain things were going on inside, she would put a small notation about what was happening in the world outside. They would get news from the outside from those who were hiding them. Another thing that surprised me was the gifts they would give each other on their birthdays. I would have thought that those things would have been rationed and not be available. I guess if you had the money, and apparently they had quite a lot, the regular Germans could still buy "things". Everything I have previously read about that time period indicated that even the "non-Jewish" German people had very little. She talks about being able to make jam from strawberries that were delivered to the warehouse. That would take lots of sugar. Apparently, the factory that they lived above was the factory that her father was a partner in, and they made pectin there. So maybe, the delivery of sugar wasn't suspicious. Or maybe that was what made them vulnerable. However, someone had to have turned them in or they would never have found them behind the bookcase in the annex.

I felt sad that her relationship with her mother was so bad. I think, had she live, that relationship might have been repaired with time as it appeared to be mostly misunderstandings combined with her adolescence. Also, her relationship with her sister wasn't good either. Her relationship with the other family was understandable considering the close quarters they shared. It has occurred to me that the Jewish people are a very gentle kind of people therefore enabling them to live under those circumstances for two years. I think it would be almost impossible for most people to live like that. I can't understand why anyone would turn them in to the Gestapo knowing they would be going to their death. Most of their German Christian and Catholic friends were wonderful people who actually put their lives on the line to protect these two families. I have never heard who turned them in.

They almost made it. Anne lives on just as she wished. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in reliving the past with Anne, her family, and friends.