Advocates Send Letter to Northville Schools Defending Anne Frank's Diary

The Kids’ Right to Read Project (KRRP) is urging the Northville Public Schools district not to remove the definitive edition of “Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl" from its curriculum. 

This version of Anne Frank’s famous diary is under challenge in Northville because of what some say is a graphic description of the female body.

KRRP sent a letter to the district Friday, defending the use of the book in middle school classrooms and libraries. 

“Anne Frank’s diary is so valuable because it brings students into a world that is at turns very different from their own and extremely familiar. Anne was in fear for her life every day in hiding but at the same time she was experiencing the changes every adolescent faces and her descriptions of those changes are real and important,” said Acacia O’Connor, KRRP coordinator, in a press release.

The letter states that the book is relevant to today’s students. It points out that the district offers alternative assignments to those who request them, stating that “to go further and remove the book potentially violates the constitutional rights of other students and parents.”

The letter was also signed by the book’s publisher, Bantam Books, and the National Council of Teachers of English, PEN America Center, Independent Book Publishers Association, American Society of Journalists and Authors and the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators.

A material review committee, assembled by the Northville schools board of education, met Friday to discuss the complaint against the district's use of the book.

Anne Frank’s diary has been challenged a number of times, particularly since the release of the unedited version, the press release said. Previous challenges, according to the press release, have centered on Frank's descriptions of her body and feelings of adolescent sexuality instead of her accounts of being forced into hiding and persecuted by the Nazis.

KRRP is a project of the National Coalition Against Censorship, co-sponsored by the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and the Association of American Publishers. 

This information was provided by the Kids’ Right to Read Project.