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Anne Frank's Diary: The Graphic Adaptation Reimagines the Young Girl's Story as a Stunning Graphic Novel
"We did our best to do our small part in creating a new way of memorializing [her story]."
Emma Sarran Webster
Courtesy of Anne Frank Fonds
Many are familiar with Anne Frank's story. She was murdered in a concentration camp during the Holocaust, but the diary she wrote while in hiding from the Nazis, before being captured, was saved. Anne's father, Otto Frank, who survived the war, later published the diary — and it has since been translated into more than 70 languages, with more than 30 million copies sold. In her diary, Anne chronicled the time she (along with her family) spent hiding from the Nazis, as well as her personal thoughts and feelings as a teenager coming of age.
Anne's story is an integral part not only of history but of women's history: Her words and message are just as inspiring and important today as they were when she wrote them, and it's vital for them to continue to reach new audiences. Enter: Anne Frank's Diary: The Graphic Adaptation, a graphic novel version of the original diary, authorized by the Anne Frank Fonds foundation, with proceeds going to charities around the world and to promoting Anne Frank's legacy.
The graphic adaptation incorporates a large portion of Anne's original writings (and follows the original chronology of her diary), including some full pages of her diary, and transforms other, small tidbits into bold, colorful images with dialogue. Writer Ari Folman and illustrator David Polonsky were tapped to bring Anne's words to life in a new way. "Any new approach that will reach younger audiences and readers is a blessing," Ari, whose parents are both Holocaust survivors, tells Teen Vogue. "We just hope it will inspire [people] to go back to the original diary and read it. It's a masterpiece, and it's amazing that a 12-year-old wrote it."
Teen Vogue caught up with Ari and David to learn more about the new adaptation, the challenges of taking on such an important story, and why it's worth it for everyone — even those who have already read the original diary — to pick this one up.
Teen Vogue: What was your initial reaction when the foundation asked you to do this?
Ari Folman: At first, we did not want to even discuss another Anne Frank adaptation, as it seemed to us that all has already been done. Then I read the original diary again for the first time since I was a teenager and found it a masterpiece, a stunning art creation. The fact that both my parents are Holocaust survivors gave me the final motivation to work on this project with the foundation.
TV: What compelled you the most to take on this project?
AF: The fear that children will read the original diary less and less. But the story must be told, and we feel the graphic adaptation is one way for us to do this.
TV: Some may think Anne Frank's diary — and her life story, for that matter — is too serious to be turned into a comic. What is your response to that?
AF: Our response was to make sure the comic adaptation respects the original content. We tried to portray the entire Anne Frank story, but adapted to today's children. To reach the readers of the diary, you also have to find their language without making any concessions to the original text. This is what we are trying to achieve.
David Polonsky: We are thinking of it a bit like an homage; we are retelling her story, and as adults in Tel Aviv we are not trying to pretend to be a 12-year-old girl in hiding in Holland. That wouldn't be sincere; we are not trying to speak through her voice, we just cannot do that. But what we can do is adopt her approach, and for me it is the fact that she uses humor and observation in the most horrible conditions you can imagine.
TV: What was the most difficult part of creating this?
AF: The most difficult part was to adapt the first 30 pages of the original diary into 10 pages of comic strips. It took many weeks and hundreds of draft pages, but once we figured it out, it became an incredible experience throughout.
TV: How did you figure it out?
AF: I constantly read and reread the diary. I just thought about what would really work, and how it would work on a grid. Then I started creating ideas for how the grid should look, how we could develop it, what should be a page with multiple illustrations and what should be a full-page illustration. I tried to only see the language of the graphic adaptation in the text. Sometimes, I could go through eight pages without anything I could convert. So I would start digging, and I dig again, and all of a sudden it jumps out at me.
TV: How do you think this adaptation helps tell Anne Frank's story differently than the original diary?
AF: I can only say that we did our best to do our small part in creating a new way of memorializing [her story]. This is our contribution to it, and I just think that eventually people will need to find new languages to do that, so that the young generation will connect with it. I truly believe that in a few years, when the very last survivors will have died, the angle that will be taken from the story will be that with every year, we are 10 years further away from the original. [...] There is a severe threat that the things we have to learn from it will not be taught and learned if we don't find a new language for them. So any new language in my opinion is blessed, as long as it stays within the framework and reaches young audiences by means of their tools, which are now very visual.
TV: What about people who have already read the diary? Why is it worth it to read this, too?
AF: We feel this adaptation shows a lot of the funny and brilliant sides of Anne's personality. [...] I love how she shows Madame Van Daan as a character: She is such a drama queen, way over the top, and you could see how much David enjoyed illustrating her.
TV: If people take away one thing from this adaption, what do you want that to be?
AF: We hope younger readers can find a connection between Anne's experience during World War II and the current situation in so many war zones. If it inspires just a few readers to action, to help those who can't help themselves, we feel that we've done our job.
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Want More from Teen Vogue? Check this out: Researchers Just Revealed 2 Hidden Pages From Anne Frank's Diary
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