Page 32 - ARUBA TODAY

A32 FEATURE
Wednesday 16 May 2018
Dutch researchers uncover dirty jokes in Anne Frank’s diary

By MIKE CORDER with a man but one
Associated Press doesn’t do that of course
AMSTERDAM (AP) — before one is married.” On
Researchers using digital prostitution, she wrote: “All
technology deciphered men, if they are normal, go
the writing on two pages with women, women like
of Anne Frank’s diary that accost them on the
that she had covered street and then they go
over with brown masking together. In Paris they have
paper, discovering four big houses for that. Papa
naughty jokes and a has been there.” One of
candid explanation of her jokes was this: “Do you
sex, contraception and know why the German
prostitution. Wehrmacht girls are in
“Anyone who reads the Holland? As mattresses for
passages that have now the soldiers.”
been discovered will be She also related this joke:
unable to suppress a “A man had a very ugly
smile,” said Frank van Vree, wife and he didn’t want
director of the Netherlands to have relations with her.
Institute for War, Holocaust One evening he came
and Genocide Studies. home and then he saw his
“The ‘dirty’ jokes are classics friend in bed with his wife,
among growing children. then the man said: ‘He gets
They make it clear that to and I have to!!!’”
Anne, with all her gifts, was Anne wrote her diary while
above all also an ordinary Teresien da Silva, left, and Ronald Leopold of the Anne Frank Foundation show a facsimile of Anne she and her family hid for
girl.” Anne, age 13 at the Frank’s diary with two pages taped off during a press conference at the foundation’s office in Am- more than two years during
time, wrote the two pages sterdam, Netherlands, Tuesday, May 15, 2018. World War II. The family went
on Sept. 28, 1942, less than Associated Press into hiding in July 1942 and
three months after she, her even closer to the girl and father before the diary editions. The deciphering remained there, provided
family and another Jewish the writer Anne Frank,” was first published in 1947 was done by researchers with food and other
family went into hiding from Ronald Leopold, executive but became available in from the Anne Frank essentials by a close-knit
the Nazis in a secret annex director of the Anne Frank more recent unabridged museum, the Institute group of helpers, until Aug.
behind a canal-side house House museum, said editions. Leopold said the for War, Holocaust and 4, 1944, when they were
in Amsterdam. Tuesday. Experts on Anne’s newly deciphered material Genocide Studies and discovered and ultimately
Later on, possibly fearing multimillion-selling diary provides an early example the Huygens Institute of deported to Auschwitz.
prying eyes or no longer said the newly discovered of how Anne “creates Netherlands History. Only Anne’s father, Otto
liking what she had written, text, when studied together a fictional situation that They photographed the Frank, survived the war.
she covered them over with the rest of her journal, makes it easier for her to pages, backlit by a flash, Anne and her sister died in
with brown paper, and reveals more about her address the sensitive topics and then used image- Bergen-Belsen camp. Anne
their content remained development as a writer that she writes about.” In processing software to was 15. After the war, Otto
a tantalizing mystery for than it does about her her diary, for example, decipher the words, which Frank had his daughter’s
decades. It turns out the interest in sex. she addressed entries to a were hard read because diary published, and it went
pages contained four jokes Anne wrote candidly in fictional friend named Kitty. they were jumbled up with on to become a symbol of
about sex that Anne herself other parts of her diary The institutions involved the writing on the reverse hope and resilience that
described as “dirty” and an about her burgeoning in the latest research said sides of the pages. has been translated into
explanation of women’s sexuality, her anatomy that because of copyright In the passage on sex, dozens of languages. The
sexual development, and her impending issues, it is unclear whether Anne described how a house where the Franks hid
sex, contraception and period. Those passages the passages will be young woman gets her was turned into a museum
prostitution. “They bring us were censored by her incorporated into new period around age 14, that is one of Amsterdam’s
saying that it is “a sign that most popular tourist
she is ripe to have relations attractions.q

A video shows how two pages taped off with brown masking pa-
A video shows the text underneath two taped off pages from Anne Frank’s diary during a press per from Anne Frank’s diary being photographed to reveal her
conference at The Anne Frank Foundation’s office in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Tuesday, May 15, writing during a press conference at The Anne Frank Founda-
2018. tion’s office in Amsterdam, Netherlands, Tuesday, May 15, 2018.