REFLECTIONS ON WRITING

Happy 86th Birthday to Anne Frank: On Choosing Kindness

Noël Duan (Assistant Editor) - June 12, 2015

Exactly a year ago, I was in the city of Amsterdam in the Netherlands, waiting in line to visit the Anne Frank House, the house-turned-museum that once hid Second World War diarist Anne Frank’s family from Nazi persecution. (…) Today would have been Frank’s 86th birthday, and since her death, The Diary of Anne Frank has been published in over 60 languages and has inspired movies, plays, and generations of girls and boys for whom keeping a diary wasn’t a cliché but a means to survival. (…)
While she was in hiding in the Secret Annex of the house in Amsterdam, she kept multiple diaries and notes written on scraps of paper that eventually became compiled together after her death. Frank wrote about growing pains, sexuality, womanhood, and following her dreams — and for millions of schoolgirls who have read her diary since, Frank was a hero. In one of my favorite passages, Frank wrote: “Women should be respected as well! Generally speaking, men are held in great esteem in all parts of the world, so why shouldn’t women have their share? Soldiers and war heroes are honored and commemorated, explorers are granted immortal fame, martyrs are revered, but how many people look upon women too as soldiers?” She was only 13 when she wrote this. (…)
She still believed in goodness. In her diary, Frank wrote, “Everyone has inside of him a piece of good news. The good news is that you don’t know how great you can be! How much you can love! What you can accomplish! And what your potential is!” (…)

Full article available at: https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/happy-86th-birthday-to-anne-frank-on-choosing-121291320318.html. Accessed on October 20, 2020 (fragment).