“I was suffocating even before we left the house, but no one bothered to ask me how I felt.”

“There's one golden rule to keep before you: laugh about everything and don't bother yourself about the others!”

“It is the silence that frightens me so in the evenings and at night...I can't tell you how oppressive it is never to be able to go outdoors, also I am very afraid that we will be discovered and be shot.”

“All day long I hear nothing but what an exasperating child I am, and although I laugh it off and pretend not to mind, I wish I could ask God to give me another personality, one that doesn't antagonize everyone.”

“Ever since I was a little girl and could barely talk, the word 'why' has lived and grown along with me. It's a well-known fact that children ask questions about anything and everything, since almost everything is new to them. That is especially true of me, and not just as a child. Even when I was older, I couldn't stop asking questions. I have to admit that it can be annoying sometimes, but I comfort myself with the thought that "You won't know until you ask," though by now I've asked so much that they ought to have made me a professor. When I got older, I noticed that not all questions can be asked and that many whys can never be answered. As a result, I tried to work things out for myself by mulling over my own questions. And I came to the important discovery that questions which you either can't or shouldn't ask in public, or questions which you can't put into words, can easily be solved in your own head. So the word 'why' not only taught me to ask, but also to think. And thinking has never hurt anyone. On the contrary, it does us all a world of good.”

“Writing in a diary is a really strange experience for someone like me. Not only because I’ve never written anything before, but also because it seems to me that later on neither I nor anyone else will be interested in the musings of a thirteen-year old schoolgirl. Oh well, it doesn’t matter. I feel like writing, and I have an even greater need to get all kinds of things off my chest.”

“Why do we trust one another so little? I know there must be a reason, but still I sometimes think it's horrible that you find you can never really confide in people, even in those who are nearest to you.”