Reflection on Diary Of A Young Girl: Anne Frank

        

            While reading Anne Frank’s diary, I noticed that Anne found the brightness in every situation despite the grimness of the condition she was in. Even though she isn't in the greatest predicament, she finds something good. For example, she said "As long as you look can fearlessly up into the heavens, as long as you know that you are pure within, and that you will still find happiness (she found it in God and nature)". She started writing in her diary because she had no one to confide in, and the ironic thing was that she stated “who will be interested in the unbosomings of a thirteen- year- old schoolgirl”.  Now, her diary is read by millions of people worldwide. She talks about how she feels about her experiences such as boys, family, puberty, and her joy and sorrows, which shows that she is like any other teenage girl. She is very mature-minded for her age, although it comes across wrong. She feels that she isn’t fully appreciated by the people around her just because she is the youngest.

           Anne Frank is very honest in her writing and is introspective. She's also a great critic of other people. In her diary, Anne tries to understand human nature and the personalities of people around her. For example, she does a very critical assessment of her mother. She views her mother as a person who lacks sympathy, and the important factors that she thinks a mother should have. Anne matures greatly during the years she stayed at the Secret Annexe. At the beginning, she said she suffered "from moods that kept my head under water...and only allowed me to see the thing subjectively without enabling me to consider quietly the words of the other side...", which also shows how honest she is about herself. Anne become more mature and allowed herself to be more aware of the other person's feelings. Anne is becoming aware of the feelings that are occurring while she's going through puberty. Instead of longing for female companionship, she strongly desires male intimacy(specifically Peter). She also undergoes her menstrual cycles which she views as a "sweet secret". Toward the end of the book, Anne assesses herself by looking at herself before she lived in the secret annexe, in 1943, and in 1944.

             In 1943, she was writing about how miserable she was and who made her feel this way. She was confused on how everyone changed so quickly. She became depressed due to the harsh remarks towards her,and resorted to Kitty. In 1944, she is focusing more on her inner self and finding  beauty and hope in a world full of ugliness and despair. She talks a little about politics and what is happening outside. She disagrees with her mother's advice on thinking about all the misery and being thankful you are not sharing it. She looked to the very thing people take for granted: sunshine, nature, air, and the green grass to find happiness in herself, and refuses to perish in misery. She talks about her ambitions to become a journalist and a famous writer. In a sense, she achieved that goal by writing in her diary and as a result she became a famous writer. She has a clear perspective of how she has evolved, and struggles with her identity. Her very last diary entry was about her fear of showing her "deeper" self( the Anne who you see when she confides in Kitty), instead of the girl who laughs and jokes around. I have had the privilege of seeing the "deeper" side of Anne Frank, and encourage you to find out about it, too.

Monie

Anne Frank:The Diary of a Young Girl

        This book isn't actually a book.It's a diary,a memoir of a young Jewish girl who felt she didn't have someone to really talk to,so she wrote to Kitty,the name she gave her diary.She got Kitty on her 13th birthday and wrote in it for the next two years of her life.The year was 1942 and World War II was one of the main subjects she talked about.It was a hard time for her.Her friends were leaving school and going into hiding.Jews were under strict rules.And then Jews were being taken away to camps where the unspeakable happened.When the Schutzstaffel or the S.S.,a unit of the Nazis,came for Margot,Anne's sister,the Franks packed up and left there home,spreading the rumor that they had left the country only they went into hiding.There hiding place was dubbed the Secret Annexe and that was where the Franks,the Van Daans,and Mr.Dussel stayed for the next two years.
        During the two years that they stayed there,the families had to get used to each other and it's always hard being forced to live in a tight place with someone else.If you share a room with a sibling you can relate.The regular fussing over what belongs to who and aggravating,sleep-depriving snoring.Anne found it especially difficult.She was close with her father but that was it.She and her mother had always had a rocky relationship,but in the Secret Annexe the relationship pretty much dissipated and was replaced with polite indifference.Anne felt everyone was always against her."Why couldn't she be more like Peter(the Van Daans son)and Margot?"Anne wrote that everyone said.And she didn't really like Mrs.Van Daan and Mr.Dussel.Anne had a temper and wrote quite frequently that she would like to slap those two.She felt criticized and that too often she was being compared to her sister.She couldn't understand why they couldn't just accept her as she was,but,Anne was mature and dealt with it it.
         By 1944,a lot of things had changed in the Secret Annexe,especially Anne.She had changed emotionally as well as physically.Her and Peter became good friends,very close,talking a lot about their parents,the War,and the books they read.She and her father grew a little apart and weren't so close as they once were.The War affected not just the outside world,but,also,the Secret Annexe inhabitants.Food supplies were low and air raids were frequent.As Anne's diary came to a close,you could really tell the difference that had happened within her,that she was more mature and independent and intellectual.Her diary ended on a good note and even though she is dead now,her diary left behind a piece of her and she has shared something great with the world.

Zuranica