Anne Frank

Anne Frank

by Josephine Poole

illustrated by Angela Barrett

As one might suspect given its content, this is probably one of the more depressing picture books out there. This narrative biography tells the well-researched story of Anne as a young girl, both before and during her hiding in the secretive annex in Amsterdam.

It opens with a paragraph from Anne Frank's The Diary of a Young Girl, which was extremely confusing for me out of context because I have not read the book, but makes much more sense after finishing the picture book. Regardless of background knowledge, it prepares the reader for the rest of the picture book, with a tone of desperation, helplessness, and fear. The lead-in paragraph of the story is also very intriguing. The author starts, "The story of Anne Frank begins with an ordinary little girl, someone you might sit next to in class," which immediately relates the story back to the personal lives of the readers, making them imagine that Anne is one of their friends, that this event could have happen to anyone. Poole continues very straightforwardly, hiding nothing: "Mostly Anne felt on top of the world. But sometimes she was afraid. There was a good reason for this: Adolf Hitler ruled Germany then, and he had vowed to get rid of the Jews. Anne Frank was a German Jew." Thus a very serious and somber tone is set from the start.

I thought it was very interesting that the author then spoke about the poverty of the German citizens in general leading up to Hitler's reign, how their country was in debt paying for damages of World War I, people were out of jobs and food, and they were searching desperately for a solution and someone to blame. Turn the page, and we see a stark quarter-page vertical spread of a LARGE mural of Hitler with a shocking red background, two little children like ants in comparison. The author describes how Hitler became the solution for many German citizens, and he pointed fingers at the Jews. Poole uses a metaphor that moved me: "It was no threat to begin with--no more than a spark. But the spark was to turn into a flame, and the flame into a blaze that would consume the whole of Europe before it was put out." 70 years later, I feel that this wildfire metaphor describes the Holocaust perfectly.

Poole also made me contemplate aspects of this horrible discrimination that I had not considered before. Often, differences in race and religion are overlooked by young children; however, the author makes it clear that Hitler's nonsense trickled down to very young children, which amazed me. "At school, children began to notice who was Jewish. Some of them mocked and even bullied their classmates. It was very bitter for the Jewish children, to be pushed around and called dirty names by boys and girls who had been their friends."

Several of Barrett's watercolor images impacted me. One passage that describes "the grown-up world" and that Germans were smashing the windows of Jewish shops contains a three-quarter spread where you can follow the flying broken glass from the text top right diagonally down left to the shopkeepers ducking behind their counter for protection. This action image frozen in time of millions of tiny shards of glass, as thin as paper, is incredible. Another painting that touched me was a half-page spread next to a passage that described the horror stories told by the Franks' new neighbors just moving to Amsterdam. Anne is in the dark hallway, overhearing her parents talk in the kitchen. The only light in the painting is coming from the slightly-open door to the kitchen, and it shows Mr. and Mrs. Frank in a worried, tight embrace. Little Anne, in her pajamas, looks so frail and wispy, and the dark hallway has a blue hue that just evokes such extreme sadness and helplessness.

The language that the author uses is incredibly specific and well-researched. For instance, "Early next morning, she struggled into several sets of underwear, two pairs of stockings, a dress, skirt, jacket, raincoat, stout shoes, a cap and scarf. It was the only way to carry her clothes--any Jew with a suitcase looked suspicious." How detailed she is! And the whole book is like this! Poole includes the detail that Anne had to leave behind her cat Moortje when her family moved into the annex to hide: this fact is easily relatable to children and helps readers empathize further with Anne if they haven't already.

The book continues to describe Anne's struggles with her family in the annex for two years and how she records it in her diary to release her frustrations, her relationship that she develops with another boy who hides in the annex Peter, and the day her family is captured and separated. We learn that Mr. Frank is the only one to survive the trauma, and Anne died of typhus in a concentration camp. The ending to the story was very abrupt and unexpected: "Anne Frank was no more than a girl, and her short life had come to an end. But her story was just beginning."

There is an afterword describing the publishing of her diary, and also a detailed chronology of German history and the Franks' story 1918-1980--definitely useful for readers!

Anne Frank House Museum:

http://www.annefrank.org/