100 Books, Songs, Films, and TV Shows I Have Loved, #17
Book: Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl
I read this book for the first time sometime during 8th grade, it might have been assigned reading as we were learning about the Holocaust. We also went to the Museum of Tolerance that year.
Learning about the Holocaust was deeply traumatic. When you go the Museum of Tolerance, you're given a photo passport card with the story of a child whose life was changed by the events of the Holocaust and, at the end, the ultimate fate of the child is revealed. It was so long ago that I do not remember the name, age, or gender of the child I received but I recall that the child was younger than me and I cried because they had died.
Reading Anne Frank's diary was an equally traumatic experience. I am not sure that I could have remained hidden away like that without going crazy. Cooped up with all of those other people, trapped in such a small space.....Anne Frank was the same age as me when she first started her diary.
The routine, the ordinary everydayness, the petty squabbles...it amazes me how little life can change even in the midst of something extraordinary. Anne Frank was a wonderful writer, very insightful and aware, but just a young girl. Amazing.
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8th grade started in August 1998, I was 2 months shy of my 13th birthday. As an adult I still have trouble wrapping my mind around the Holocaust, of the sheer number of people who were murdered and the sheer number of soldiers who died fighting World War II. 6 million Jews died, two-thirds of Europe's Jews. Over 60 million people were killed by the time the war ended.
60 million people killed, the entire population of California and Texas is just over 63 million. Can you imagine California and Texas being entirely wiped out? Mind-boggling.
So as an 8th grader, reading Anne Frank's diary and learning about World War II and the Holocaust was overwhelming to say the least.
I can't help but try and put myself in Anne Frank's shoes, to try and imagine myself as a Jew in Europe during that time period and to know that I would have ended up dead and probably far sooner than Anne Frank did. And there's no way I could have written a diary like her's.
There are people who say the Holocaust was a fabrication, that it never happened. How can they look at the pictures, read the diaries and letters, see the numbered tattoos, listen to the testimonies and then say that it never happened. My God, I wish like hell that it *was* an elaborate fabrication but when confronted with all of that....
Click to viewI read this book for the first time sometime during 8th grade, it might have been assigned reading as we were learning about the Holocaust. We also went to the Museum of Tolerance that year.
Learning about the Holocaust was deeply traumatic. When you go the Museum of Tolerance, you're given a photo passport card with the story of a child whose life was changed by the events of the Holocaust and, at the end, the ultimate fate of the child is revealed. It was so long ago that I do not remember the name, age, or gender of the child I received but I recall that the child was younger than me and I cried because they had died.
Reading Anne Frank's diary was an equally traumatic experience. I am not sure that I could have remained hidden away like that without going crazy. Cooped up with all of those other people, trapped in such a small space.....Anne Frank was the same age as me when she first started her diary.
The routine, the ordinary everydayness, the petty squabbles...it amazes me how little life can change even in the midst of something extraordinary. Anne Frank was a wonderful writer, very insightful and aware, but just a young girl. Amazing.
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8th grade started in August 1998, I was 2 months shy of my 13th birthday. As an adult I still have trouble wrapping my mind around the Holocaust, of the sheer number of people who were murdered and the sheer number of soldiers who died fighting World War II. 6 million Jews died, two-thirds of Europe's Jews. Over 60 million people were killed by the time the war ended.
60 million people killed, the entire population of California and Texas is just over 63 million. Can you imagine California and Texas being entirely wiped out? Mind-boggling.
So as an 8th grader, reading Anne Frank's diary and learning about World War II and the Holocaust was overwhelming to say the least.
I can't help but try and put myself in Anne Frank's shoes, to try and imagine myself as a Jew in Europe during that time period and to know that I would have ended up dead and probably far sooner than Anne Frank did. And there's no way I could have written a diary like her's.
There are people who say the Holocaust was a fabrication, that it never happened. How can they look at the pictures, read the diaries and letters, see the numbered tattoos, listen to the testimonies and then say that it never happened. My God, I wish like hell that it *was* an elaborate fabrication but when confronted with all of that....