"Anne Frank: A History for Today"

Dion Chamberlain
University of Otago
Department of English

Deep South v.3 n.3 (Spring 1997)


Copyright (c) 1997 by Dion Chamberlain, all rights reserved.

Anne Frank

"A heart speaks louder than a colour can" -- Ben Harper

The recent publication of Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl: A New Definitive Edition (1995) brought one of the most celebrated and accessible Jewish faces into prominence once again. Over the years Anne Frank has come, more than any one person, to represent the Holocaust; hers is the single face which not only encapsulates the suffering and senseless murder of millions, but also gives a personal depth to what has become a barrage of intense historical images. Anne Frank: A History for Today uses her story as an educational intermediary, documenting the holocaust's effect upon the Frank family in order to avoid the often reductive and distancing approach of a grotesque visual-historical account. The intention, it seems, is to bypass that part of our brain now de-sensitised to such acts of large scale violence by keeping the exhibition on a very personal level.

The exhibition consists of a video called "Dear Kitty" (the name Anne gives to her diary), and a series of photographs and quotations constructing various personal accounts and perspectives of Germany, Holland and Poland in the midst of war. A thread of historical information is carefully included so these personal accounts can be placed in the wider context of Hitler's regime and the reasons for its rise and fall. The last quarter of the exhibition is dedicated to both outwardly violent and repressed, unspoken discrimination (which can be equally destructive), and ways in which we, as individuals, can help put an end to it.

The exhibition makes clear that all people whom the Nazis considered as impure, suffered and died under their regime. 'Aryan' racial specifications meant that ethnic and sexual minorities were persecuted or killed. These specifications also condemned 80,000 people with physical and mental disabilities to systematic extermination. As you move around the exhibition the central concern becomes increasingly evident; what happened to Anne can happen to anyone. The title "A History for Today" captures not just the sense that we can learn from past mistakes, but also the fact that discrimination and the resulting atrocities still occur; for example "ethnic cleansing" is a practice recently employed in Rwanda, Bosnia and Cambodia.

The aim of the exhibition is solely to educate: no profit is made from door takings. In each centre the Anne Frank Foundation rely upon volunteers to guide groups of school children around the exhibition in an attempt to provoke discussion about the implications discrimination and the potential effect upon themselves and others. I was one of twenty-five people who volunteered for the Dunedin exhibition dates. Most of the other guides had such an intense emotional investment in the exhibition; many were Jewish, some had experienced the war first hand, others were without family members because of Hitler's death camps. The opportunity to listen to their personal histories made the exhibition evn more powerful.

Many aspects of the training day and the exhibition still haunt me now. The illuminated photographs were full of faces I felt I could so easily have seen in the streets of Dunedin. In a strange way I felt it had a lot to do with reading Anne's diary. Like many people I spoke to, I felt that I knew Anne well, before I entered the exhibition. It is this intimate and personal relationship which extends to the anonymous faces of the concentration camp photographs in the last half of the exhibition. Somehow our relationship with Anne allowed the recognition that these people, destined for the gas chambers, were individuals with families too, stripped of their right to live.

Included in the exhibition is a photograph of an Auschwitz barrack room where the tortured face of Elie Wiesel, writer and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize 1986, peers from a group of starving workmen. His book "Night" (1956), which I read soon after volunteering, is a record of his childhood in the death camps of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. Weisel recounts his arrival at Auschwitz:

Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath the silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my faith forever. Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself. Never. (45)

The gate to Auschwitz: the inscription reads "work makes one free".

These types of personal account were constant reminders of the emotional depth and intensity which surrounds the holocaust. I heard many stories from a guide who lived in Holland during the war. He described the bombing raids and his childish excitement at the planes descending with their deadly cargo. It was only when a young woman covered his eyes upon the impact of the blast, that he realised the explosions had consequences. I also heard of the death camp trains which had ultimate priority on the tracks; even wounded German soldiers on trains from the front had to wait.

I asked so many questions of myself and the world in those few days as I stared at the very darkest potential of humanity -- but how could I relate this back to people who need to learn these lessons? Among the groups, children of different ethnicities were re-inforcing the very prejudices I was trying to depose. On the wall outside the exhibition someone painted the Nazi salute "sieg heil.". Their own ignorance was reinforced by the mis-spelling of both words. However there were also many who did respond, empathise, and realise that a certain responsibility lies with each individual; that this type of education begins on a personal level and radiates outwards.

Polish children imprisoned behind the wire fences of Auschwitz.

One of the lasting impressions I have of Anne Frank: A History for Today is the astounding optimism of Anne's diary entries in the face of such adverse circumstances:

It's difficult in times like these: ideals, dreams and cherished hopes rise within us, only to be crushed by grim reality. It's a wonder I haven't abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart. (330)
One can only hope that she retained these views, even in her last days in Bergen-Belsen where she died of typhus a few days after her sister, and only one month before the camp was liberated. Anne was unaware that her father was still alive and it has been suggested that maybe she could have struggled on had she known.

Anne Frank: A History for Today is certainly a useful tool for the education of minds both young and old. The anti-discrimination message which comes through is one which many people need to address worldwide. These things will happen again if we do not take time to remind ourselves, and our children, of humanity's darkest potential.

The mass graves of Bergen-Belsen.

Works Cited

Frank, Anne. The Diary of a Young Girl: The Definitive Edition. Ed. Otto H. Frank and Mirjam Pressler, London: Penguin, 1997.

Harper, Ben. The Will to Live Virgin Music, 1997.

Wiesel, Elie. Night, trans. by Stella Rodway. London: Penguin, 1981.


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