Terrible events that shake the world at the beginning of the last century left awful marks in the souls of the people who faced this tragedy, the Holocaust. Nowadays we can’t even imagine what the time it was, but it does not mean that we are allowed to forget it. Quite the contrary, we should remember not only the events that happened that time.
The writings of Anne Frank in her book dedicated to the Holocaust and called The Diary of a Young Girl should be considered as the greatest masterpiece of that period. It would be interesting to compare two entries from this book to understand the importance and significance of the themes issued in this writing.
Thus, one can find out a lot of interesting information about the character and the world-views of Anne Frank as well as plunge into her world comparing the two extracts of Saturday, 20 June, 1942 and Wednesday, 12 January, 1944.
The entries that were chosen for analysis feature the topics of the Holocaust, militarism, relationships with other people, self-identity of the main character and her writing style which are described in a hopeless voice.
The first theme that unites the fragments is girl’s attitude towards her diary and her version of the relationships in her family. The first extract, Saturday, 20 June, that is under consideration is the second writing in the diary of Anne Frank. That’s why it is considered to be so important for analyzing the whole context of the book. Wednesday, 12 January, 1944’s fragment seems to be a continuation of the first entry.
The thing that impresses the reader is a discrepancy between the themes aroused in the diary and the age of the author. The first impression about Anne Frank that you get when you read the first lines of the Saturday, 20 June, 1942’s writing is that this girl is a very thoughtful and precocious child.
She approaches her diary very serious because she emphasizes that she is not eager to describe her ordinary routine, but her feelings and considerations about the most important themes. However, first of all, we get acquainted with her family. She describes its members very bare giving just the most necessary facts.
Quite the opposite situation, we can observe in the entry of Wednesday, 12 January, 1944 where we can see the relationships between Anne and her mother, girl’s version about the lack of understanding in her family. Thus, she tries to find excuses for her mother who she considers to give too little attention to her daughter.
The second theme that unites these two fragments is the girl’s reflection about her self- identification. It is very interesting to learn about the theory that Anne creates about herself in the society.
She tries to understand in Wednesday, 12 January, 1944’s entry what it is to “see myself through someone else’s eyes” (Frank 150) and find her place in the world. It is shocking when you understand what a deep abyss of despair is hidden in her soul.
The solitude that runs through the whole two entries is described in the voice of the narration that seems to be hopeless, but it doesn’t except the hope for a future improvement. The girl says that she wants the diary that was present to her on her thirteen’s birthday “itself to be my friend” (Frank 13). This fact says that Anne has no one to reveal her feelings to and confide in.
Though she admits that she is surrounded by a lot of people, relatives and friends, she feels alone. This theme continues in the second part of the Wednesday, 12 January, 1944’s entry where the girl ponders over her dissimilarity with other people in way of thinking and seeing the world. That is the main reason why she is so lonely and can not find a kindred spirit.
However, she blames no one, but herself in this situation. The reader feels how much the girl loves her family. It is visible in her descriptions and worries connected with her grandmother in the first entry and the relationships with her mother and her older sister Margot in the second writing.
Her diary appears to be her only resort. However, her despair becomes a little bit lesser when she writes about her boy friend Peter at the end of the second entry.
The thing that made the girl so self-critical is a hard time that she lives in. The spirit of the Holocaust and growing militarism influences the whole book. Though Anne gives just bare facts of the life of the ordinary Jews in Saturday, 20 June, 1942’s extract, you can understand that it bothers the young girl.
Just an enumeration of the limitations that the Jews were to face hints on the hidden risk of this measures and growing tension in the world that doesn’t know what to wait from these orders. It seems that such a young girl can not understand the full threat of the situation, but it appears that Anne has a special perception of the reality that allows her to appraise the situation even better than many adults.
She aims her diary to be a description, “a mirror in which Anne could see her own reflection” (Kopf 3). We can trace how she tries to change her manner of writing because she begins keeping diary not for herself, but for the others.
A time that made the young girl grow older too early almost deprived her of her childhood and made her feel alone and alien to that world. You feel that Anne longs for understanding and seems to be desperate, but doesn’t exclude hope for better life.
Analyzing the extracts of Anne Franks’ diary, you understand that her book is a tribute to the Holocaust. It also deals with her world-views, the unjust regime, humiliation and total extermination of the nation.
Works Cited
Frank, Anne. Anne Frank The Diary of a Young Girl. Trans. B. M. Mooyaart-Doubleday. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1952.
Kopf, Hedda Rosner. Understanding Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl: A Student Casebook to Issues, Sources, and Historical Documents. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1997.