Diary of a Young Girl

¶ … Diary of a Young Girl" as seen from a general perspective

Anne Frank's "The Diary of a Young Girl" is one of the most compelling accounts documenting the experiences of a Jewish individual in World War Two's Europe. The book is comprised from a series of texts that the young adolescent wrote in an attempt to discharge stress she accumulated as the Nazi war machine occupied the Netherlands. While many historians feel that this book makes it difficult for the masses to understand the more general aspect of the Second World War in Europe, the truth is that it puts across the exact message that it is meant to express: war is horrible and war crimes are even more horrific.

Susan Sontag's 2003 book "Regarding the Pain of Others" partly supports individuals who believe that it would only be natural for the world to become acquainted with accounts like Anne Frank's in order to be able to gain a more complex understanding of the gravity of warfare and the damage that it produces. The fact that Sontag regards war photography as one of the most powerful strategies that the media can use in an attempt to raise public awareness makes it possible for one to look at "The Diary of a Young Girl" as being very similar to war photography when considering the feelings it induces in readers.

Reading a text written by a little girl as she was witnessing the atrocities happening around her is probable to influence any individual in thinking that it is essential for him or her to get actively involved in condemning warfare and its supporters regardless of the motives behind it. Simply thinking about the vivid picture that she painted with the help of letters makes it difficult for a person to accept that he or she is actually very similar to the Nazis, as there obviously were numerous individuals who came to appreciate Hitler's ideology because they were manipulated into thinking that it was in their best interest to become an active part of a movement meant to remove all ethnic groups believed to be inferior to the German race.

Most people who read and appreciate Anne Frank's text know very little about war and are only able to look at it from the eyes of a scared little girl who suffered greatly. For some people this is enough to understand that war is wrong and that it is important for them to oppose this concept. However, it is actually important for society to comprehend that no books, war pictures, or data from the front lines is enough to paint the true image of warfare.

Sontag actually experienced warfare from a first-hand perspective and even though she appreciates that many people try to condemn war by making use of pictures and stories, she believes that it is immature to adopt such attitudes. From her perspective, it would be impossible for a person to provide others with a chance to understand what warfare is as long as the respective individuals do not experience it themselves.

Being sad, horrified, and sharing other people's pain does not actually mean that a person knows what warfare really feels like. An individual cannot possibly be able to comprehend the horrible nature of war until he is actually present in one. The problem with only being familiar with warfare from pictures and books is that people find it difficult to see the general nature of warfare because they only focus on particular aspects of it.

Anne Frank's diary is impressive and is likely to have a significant influence on all persons who read it. However, because many people experience their first interaction with the Holocaust by reading this book society is slowly losing its understanding of the concept as whole. "The concentration camps -- that is, the photographs taken when the camps were liberated in 1945 -- are most of what people associate with Nazism and the miseries of the Second World War" (Sontag 70).

Although Anne Frank's diary plays an important role in making the world understand the damage provoked by the Second World War, it is also important for its readers to focus on getting information from other sources so as for them to be able to see the bigger picture. The Second World War was not all about little girls suffering as they were hiding from the Nazis and about concentration camps shown in photographs. It was about a global form of suffering and about tens millions of people who struggled to put across moral attitudes, but fought for their lives in any way that they possibly could.