A Birthday Gift
Anne Frank celebrate her 13th birthday on 12 June 1942. In a state of great excitement, she is allowed to enter the living room shortly after 7 am, where her presents are waiting. Her favourite gift is a red-and-white checked autograph album that she selected herself a few days earlier. It is to become her diary. She writes her first entry that very day:
«I hope I will be able to confide everything to you, as I have never been able to confide in anyone, and I hope you will be a great source of comfort and support.»
June 12th, 1942
In her first entries, Anne describes her school friends and writes about her family and everyday life in Merwedeplein in Amsterdam. She soon starts to write her entries as letters to imaginary friends. The most important of these friends is called Kitty.
May 11th, 1944«You’ve known for a long time that my greatest wish is to be a journalist, and later on, a famous writer. We’ll have to wait and see if these grand illusions (or delusions!) will ever come true, but till now I’ve had no lack of topics. In any case, after the war I’d like to publish a book called The Secret Annex. It remains to be seen whether I’ll succeed, but my diary can serve as the basis.»«No, on the surface I seem to have everything, except my one true friend. All I think about when I’m with friends is having a good time. I can’t bring myself to talk about anything but ordinary everyday things. We don’t seem to be able to get any closer, and that’s the problem. Maybe it’s my fault that we don’t confide in
each other. In any case, that’s just how things are, and unfortunately they’re not liable to change. This is why I’ve started the diary.
Diary, 20. June 1942
To enhance the image of this long-awaited friend in my imagination, I don’t want to jot down the facts in this diary the way most people would do, but I want the diary to be my friend, and I’m going to call this friend Kitty»
During the Second World War, the German-Jewish Frank family and four other Jews had to hide from the National Socialists in Amsterdam. During this time, 13-year-old Anne Frank recorded her thoughts and feelings in her diary. However, she also described everyday life in the secret annex and the overwhelming fear of being discovered. The diary ends on 1 August 1944; three days later the secret annex was discovered, and Anne died seven months later in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. After the war, the various diaries written by his daughter were returned to Anne’s father who had extracts from them published for the first time in 1947. The complete version of the Diary of Anne Frank has so far been published in more than 70 languages. Many revised versions have also been published. The globally binding version that was published in 1991 contains all the sections of the original diary.
