The Diary of a Young Girl

"It's really a wonder that I haven't dropped all my ideals because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet, I keep them, because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can't build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever-approaching thunder, which will destroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again."

"Is discord going to show itself while we are still fighting, is the Jew once again worth less than another? Oh, it is sad, very sad, that once more, for the umpteenth time, the old truth is confirmed: What one Christian does is his own responsibility, what one Jew does is thrown back at all Jews."

Such mind blowing, deep and sensible quotes were pieced together by a young fourteen-year-old during WWII. Those who have watched Freedom Writers are no strangers to Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl.


I'd just finished reading this book. It's one of the most heart-rending piece of writing that had moved me. Reading her diary reminded me of my teenage years, and the heart issues we had to deal with - family, ambitions, emotions, best friends, siblings and boys - was not that different. Of course she had it the harder way.

Anne, a jew, was 12+ when WWII began and her family went on a hide-out for 2 years escaping death from the Nazis. At 12, like most teenage girls, she started her first diary, penning down her deepest thoughts and most intimate secrets, and didn't stop until the Secret Annexe was busted.

As I read her diary, there's this curiosity and eagerness wanting to know what next. Towards the end of the diary, Anne was noticeably more mature and hopeful especially it was almost the end of war. Always misunderstood, she was finally able to grasp hold of adulthood and was beginning to get it right. Her relationship was also blossoming, not just with the only young male in the hide-out but with her family as well.

And when I finally reach the end, I regretted knowing it. The Franks (except her father) and Van Danns (another family who shared the hide-out) were so close to surviving. Following a tip-off, their hide-out was busted. They were the last batch whom were sent to the concentration camp. Too dampening.

Her death was perhaps inevitable but to learn how she died especially in the heights of her optimism left a bitter after taste. It further raged me learning about another life having to suffer the inhumanity of war in the name of justice by a certain someone.

Nevertheless, it's a good read. And I'm glad to have read it.