The Key West citizen. [volume] (Key West, Fla.) 1879-current, 1952-08-28
KY Books
BY A. dc T. cinsrss

LIE O4f1n1 VI n I0O4N0 MANI
by Anne Frank, memories, pub
lished by Doubleday Publishing Co.
New York City, 285 pages.)
This diary of Is year old Jewish
girl forced to hide with her family
for two years in a secret annex
behind her fathers place of bus
mess in Amsterdam, Is the finest
book which has yet come out OF
World War II.
The author put down the writ
IN record of those two years
With all clarity, brilliance and
sensitivity of the keenest Adde'S
cent mind of her race. In March
D45, two months before Holland
vas freed she died in the concen-
ration camp at Bergen Belsen.
Presented with the blunt massive
figure of eight million Jews dying
in the Hitler inspired butcheries
and prosecutions all over Europe,
the human mind and emotions are
shocked. But eight million of any
thing is too much for the human
emotional system to comprehend.
Try as the reader might the pro-
erosion of the eight million before
his eyes instead of increasing our
horror, forces a defensive thick
ening of the skin in order to sur
vive the pitiful figures on parade
to death.
But this diary recording the two
years sof hiding of eight Jewish
people brings them close enough
to the everyday, so that they be-
come friends and neighbors the
reader has known. When he knows
they have ceased to live and have
become victims of a terrible tenn
porary madness on the part of
the other human beings, they are
the people next door or across the
street who are gone.
The diary begins a little before
the family leaves their home in
Amsterdam to 60 to the secret an.
mex where they are to hide. Little
Anne's inclusion of this prelude of
her former life seems almost the
following Of the bidding of some
literary god who knew this picture
of her former milieu was artist.
ically right.
The people in the secret annex
are Anne Frank, her father, moth.
er and sister Margot; Mr.. and Mrs.
Van Daan and their son Peter;
and an old dentist, Mr.. Dussel.
Each of them lives with great vi
witness on the pages of the diary,
as the everyday intimacies reveal
the mosaic Of their characters. And
we love them and are annoyed
with them in turn, as is the au-
thor. Only the father is slightly
idealized, but even in this ideal
ization something is revealed OF
the character of both the father
and the daughter.
AS the reader watches the drama
of the two years unfold, he sees
what is happening inside the Sec
ret annex, and what is happening
outside. Anne describes the emo
tons of the Jews when there is
the sound of bombings outside.
They know there is death for them
if they are struck personally and
if their place Of abode is disturbed,
death awaits them in the streets.
They hear news from the city out
side that no Jew is safe anywhere
in the city. They know that Mus
solini has disappeared from the
war picture and Italy has fallen to
the Allies.
Here is the young authors de-
scription of one of the outside e.
vents:
g. 1t Is terrible outside. Day
and night more of those poor mis-
cradle people are being dragged
off, with nothing but a rucksack
and little money. On the way
they are deprived even of these
possessions. Families are torn a.
part, the men, women and children
are separated. Children coming
home from school find that their
parents have disappeared. Women
return from shopping to find their
homes shut up and their families
gone. there is nothing we can
do but wait as calmly as we can
till the misery comes to an end.
The earth waits: and there are
many who wait for death. :"
And the events inside the secret
annex are all there in complete
detail the pretty chickering's which
come from so many people living
at close quarters, the day they
hear thieves in the warehouse par
of the building, the time the bag
of beans falls all around little
Anne. the birthday party, the St.
Nicholas party, the various occupa-
tons In which the family indulge
to keep themselves from madness,
the day the rat bites Peter.
In one entry Anne describes the
monotony Of the meals:
IF the conversation at meal
times isn't over politics or . delic-
ious meal, then Mummy or Mrs.
Van Daan throw out one Of the
old stories Of their youth. which
we've heard so many times before;