The Annex is an ideal place to hide in. It may be damp and lopsided, but there’s probably not a more comfortable hiding place in all of Amsterdam. No, in all of Holland.
I understand my girlfriends better than my own mother. Isn’t that a shame?
Alone I had to face the difficult task of changing myself, to stop the everlasting reproaches, which were so oppressive and which reduced me to such terrible despondency.
Thursday, 5 August, 1943.
Dear God, I have everything I could wish for, while fate has her in its deadly clutches. She was as devout as I am, maybe even more so, and she too wanted to do what was right. But then why have I been chosen to live, while she’s probably going to die? What’s the difference between us? Why are we now so far apart?
Ordinarily people don’t know how much books can mean to someone whose cooped up. Our only diversions are reading, studying and listening to the wirelessly.
Expectation and hope generate tension, as does fear.
My parents are much too afraid of an argument to say anything, which is a shame, because I think people like that should always be given a taste of their own medicine.
If we can save even one of our friends, the rest doesn’t matter.
I’m surprised at my childish innocence. Deep down I know I could never be that innocent again, however much I’d like to be.
Who else but me can I turn to for comfort?
I’m finally getting optimistic. Now, at last, things are going well!
Bep’s engaged! The news isn’t much of a surprise, though none of us are particularly pleased. Bertus may be a nice, steady, athletic young man, but Bep doesn’t love him, and to me that’s enough reason to advise her against marrying him.
I need my mother to set a good example and be a person I can respect, but in most matters she’s an example of what not to do.
Nine o’clock in the evening.
No matter how poor one is, one can still give others riches.
I mean that most people, married or single, stand inwardly alone.
In one Way or another, the day would come when my name would be a household word and my picture would occupy a place of honour in the memory book of every damp-eyed film fan.
Which books are ruined?” I asked Margot, who was going through them. “Algebra,” Margot said. But as luck would have it, my algebra book wasn’t entirely ruined. I wish it had fallen right in the vase. I’ve never loathed any book as much as that one.
In my imagination, the man I thought was trying to get inside the Secret Annex had kept growing and growing until he’d become not only a giant but also the cruelest Fascist in the world.
I am young and strong and living a great adventure.