Reader Letters February 1956

The Stage Anne Frank
TO THE EDITOR OF COMMENTARY:
Algene Ballif’s complaint that the adapta-
tion of the Diary of Anne Frank (in “Anne Frank on Broadway,” November 1955), presents Anne Frank as “the image of the American idea of adolescence” and neglects her serious side suggests a major misconception of the original diary and the Broadway play. Miss Ballif, calls the stage version of Anne a “Jew-
ish Corliss Archer,” a canned adolescent, and objects that she puts her hair up and punctu- ates her speech with artificial pauses.
Anne Frank revealed herself in her diary as a girl with many of the preoccupations of ado- lescence. She liked clothes and collected photo- graphs of film stars. She was vain about her appearance and her conquests, and later had a characteristically hesitant love affair. She also had special gifts. She was an unusually pre- cocious reader and … an extraordinary writer. She had courage and humor, and was uncom- monly aware of herself and others….
But these qualities which resulted in such an achievement as her diary should not make us forget that she was a normal, in many ways still conventional, girl. That the adapters of the diary have managed to present her on the stage as at once typical and extraordinary is much to their credit and to the credit of Anne Frank’s
remarkable spirit, whose main quality, as she herself so often and so sensibly remarked, was its wholeness…. It would have been as much
an error for the adapters to overlook this whole- ness as for one to assume that Jane Austen never powdered her nose….
But Miss Ballif clearly came prepared to find a quite different young girl from the one who wrote in the diary, and saw on the stage a ver- sion of Anne Frank quite unlike the one who
appears there. Her claim that the stage Anne reflects a vulgarized (i.e. American) image of adolescence may reflect in turn her own . . . incorrect view of the play.
An example of this is her failure to recognize the adapters’ obvious intention in the scene in which Anne dresses herself elegantly, visits Peter, and is kissed. Far from playing the coquette at the end of this scene, as Miss Ballif claims, Anne leaves Peter’s room elated,
and so obviously full of love and excitement at
having reached this long-awaited stage in her development that her reactions are not only dramatically inevitable, but precise reflections of the character we find in the diary. She tosses her scarf over her shoulder, as a great lady
should, and eager to share her love, kisses the assembled families as she crosses the stage to her own room.
Miss Ballif went to the theater expecting to find in Anne Frank a woman of “high moral seriousness”-F. R. Leavis in a pinafore. She saw instead a bobby sox Mae West. The com- plexity of Miss Ballif’s visual problem is appalling.
BARBARA EPSTEIN
New York City
Miss BALLIF writes:
Barbara Epstein’s experience both of Anne Frank’s diary and the play about her seems too alien to my own to argue about. I hope, however, that my remarks can clarify some- thing.
I do not at all object to Anne’s putting up her hair, which she often did, experimentally, in the real Secret Annex. I object, rather, to the particular use made of this in the play- i.e., to her putting up her hair to go see Peter -a piece of business not in the diary in that
connection, and not, I think, relevant to Anne’s
relation with Peter, which was a notably undecorated one.
The dramatization on Broadway certainly makes Anne “typical,” but it does not make her in the least “extraordinary,” as Mrs. Epstein
seems to feel it does. And to “forget that she
was a normal conventional girl” is not a danger -certainly not in these United States where we are never permitted to forget such things, where the normal and conventional are crammed down our throats, and where we con- stantly seek the normal and conventional to cling to. What is a danger is our not compre- hending those “qualities which resulted in such an achievement as her diary.” Anne Frank’s diary is important not for its caressing little gusts of normality and typicality, but for what is unique and extraordinary about her. A better playwright might have seen this and written a better play.
183
LETTERS FROM READERS .~~~sCOMMENTARY –
As it is, it leans heavily upon the crutch
of typicality and seems to take for granted that
we will supply, from our racial memories, as it
were, the uniqueness. The success of the play
is in large part due, I think, to this accurate
calculation that its audiences would bring to it
something that was not actually there. The
adapters seemed to feel that they were therefore
at liberty to sentimentalize and indulge the
“familiar” to the hilt-which is exactly what
they did. It is significant that Anne’s film col-
lection, and not her elaborate charts of family
trees (over which she spent far more time),
got into the script. It makes so many of us feel
good that she kept a film collection just as we
did when we were young girls, and that we
shared other fond foolishness with her. In
identifying with Anne in these surface similari-
ties we can unconsciously identify with Anne’s
differences and superiorities-without ever hav-
ing taken the trouble to learn just what they
were. It is one of our usual errors in the search
for identity. A fool and a wise man may easily
find they have something in common, but it
is only the fool who can make the mistake
of believing he is a wise man for it.
As for the “love scene,” I can only quote
from Anne’s own entry of Friday, April 28,
1944 (p. 193):
” . . Every evening, after the last kiss, I
would like to dash away, not to look into his
eyes any more-away, away, alone in the
darkness.
And what do’ I have to face, when I reach
the bottom of the staircase? Bright lights,
questions, and laughter; I have to swallow it
all and not show a thing. My heart still feels
too much; I can’t get over a shock such as I
received yesterday [Anne’s first kiss on the lips
from Peter] all at once…. Peter has taken
possession of me and turned me inside out;
surely it goes without saying that anyone
would require a rest and a little while to re-
cover from such an upheaval?”
A re-reading of the entire section, if not the
entire diary, would be helpful. ALGENE BALLIF
New York City
The Kastner Case
To THE EDITOR OF COMMENTARY:
Mr. Kurt Grossman’s call [in the January
“Letters from Readers”] for an authoritative
study of the attempts to rescue European Jewry
during World War II will be welcomed. I find
it more difficult to agree with his opinion that
my article would have benefited from a closer
study of the facts contained in Reitlinger’s and
Poliakov’s books. There is very little in Polia-
kov on the attempts to save the Jews of Conti-
nental Europe. There is not much more in
Reitlinger’s study, and the sections pertaining
to Kastner’s activities are unfortunately not
quite reliable, factually-one of the things that
emerged from the Jerusalem trial.
I would like to use this opportunity to modify
my views on another point. Dealing with the
data chosen by Judge Halevi for pronouncing
the judgment, I wrote “. . . he chose to pro-
nounce the judgment at a moment that insured
its reappearance in the headlines-but perhaps this is unfair, perhaps the trial meant more to
him than the elections and their outcome. I
don’t know.” On further reflection I think I was
wrong to leave the question open. The choice
of the date for the pronunciation of the judg-
ment was highly unfortunate: political passions
always run highest on election eve and the
general climate of opinion is never less pro-
pitious. But there is no reason to assume that
Judge Halevi in his choice of the date was
influenced by any extraneous motive.
WALTER Z. LAQUEUR
London, England
Biography and Faith
To THE EDITOR OF COMMENTARY:
The biography of his father and his own re-
action to it by David Daiches (“My Father,
and His Father,” December) is unfortunately
typical of our times. One saw much of [this
attitude] among the American army youth in
England during the war, and it is prevalent
among undergraduates and “intellectuals” in
Israel. David, whom I seem to remember in his
early youth, states “as always he [his father]
was more at home in public than in private
utterance.” . . . David lost a lot by failing to
reach the intimacies which [religious faith] en-
genders. “Thou shall not” has much to answer
for in creating the apathy which poisons the
atmosphere of our moral and religious life today.
The transition of Jewish life from the ghetto
is painful and difficult; only “love of the law”
and the great peace which it engenders can
preserve it for our children and for the world.
I knew Salis, and, rather better, his brother
Samuel, of Jews’ College…. To Salis, Jewish
life was austere. He was a scholar and a fighter.
To Samuel it was a life of love; both were
workers in the “pasture of the Lord,” each in
his different way.
David asks whether his father’s life, in the
end, was not a tragedy…. Salis Daiches did
much to make Judaism understood and re-
spected. Such a life is never a tragedy.
ISIDORE WARTSra
Bangor, North Wales, England
184LETTERS FROM READERS
“The Uptown Social Club”
To THE EDrroR oF COMMENTARY:
… When you published the article “The
Uptown Social Club” by Theodore Frankel, in
your November issue . . . you were obviously
referring to the Mid-Manhattan Club of which
I am the membership chairman, and a mem-
ber of the board of directors. Our president,
Sol Marks (Sam Fine, as you call him) works
as much as sixteen hours a day for the club,
sometimes seven days a week, without a cent of pay, for the sole purpose of bringing Jewish
boys and girls together…. His magnanimous
contribution to our society deserves more than
the derogatory … remarks of Mr. Frankel….
1. Our girls are not gum chewers.
2. Our girls do not wear leather coats; they
for the most part come very well dressed. I per- sonally reject those who are unpresentable,
and my standards are high.
3. Our television set has very weak audio
and does not blare, but rather cannot be heard
ten feet away. I have been trying to fix this for
the longest time.
4. Our married couples are not essentially
card players, and gambling is not allowed on
the premises.
5. I have seen Sol Marks [the president] de-
feated at the board meetings entirely too many times for anybody to claim that he uses steam-
roller tactics.
6. The Riverside Plaza Hotel is no more
ancient, dirty, or antiquated than any other
building in New York.
7. Maybe Mr. Frankel doesn’t have the
ability to meet a girl, and blames this on the
club. We announce over three marriages a
month.
I could continue this for pages….
PAUL NERNKEN
Brooklyn, New York
To THE EDIToR OF COMMENTARY:
. . .The article by Mr. Theodore Frankel,
purporting to be a truthful representation of
an organization known as “The Uptown Social
Club,” [was] supposedly a documentary piece.
. . . In truth, it is . . . a . . . shallow account
. . . descriptive of one individual’s highly ec-
centric feelings toward the Mid-Manhattan Club …
There are certain points of a non-fictional nature which I would like to stress.
1. The club is a state-chartered organization
which devotes itself to social, cultural, and:
philanthropic objectives, and contrary to Mr.
Frankel, has met the . . . needs of most of its
membership (myself included) admirably. 2. The membership of the Mid-Manhattan
Club consists largely of professional men and
women as well as reputable and responsible
business people. It avoids catering to the . . .
crude gallivanters who play a prominent role in
Mr. Frankel’s fantasy.
3. The club has been honored by many
prominent people including Mayor Robert F.
Wagner and Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr. 4. Its president, Sol Marks, is not the . . . character that Mr. Frankel would like to have
his readers believe…. He is an intelligent,
serious, and hard-working administrator who
makes his living as a real estate executive and
not as an important member of this or any other organization.
I’ve wondered just what really possessed Mr.
Frankel in writing such an incredible piece
which by indirection . . . mocks . . . other reputable Jewish organizations striving to serve
thousands of young Jewish people in a forth-
right way. He may not really have exposed any-
thing but a personality of a distinctly negative
character … the type that consistently derides
varied social groups….
IRVING DICKSTEIN
New York City
To THE EDITOR OF COMMENTARY:
Many young single people will readily
identify themselves with the members of
Theodore Frankel’s “Uptown Social Club.”
But they will also ask what solution there is
to their loneliness and inability to find friends
of their own age group and background. How
does Mr. Frankel feel the situation can be
improved? … I wonder… private parties? … This “rat-race” situation is a very depressing
one to young men and women; they would
certainly appreciate any help and suggestions
if Mr. Frankel has any to offer.
LEE GARNER New York City
Correction
In George Lichtheim’s “Nationalism, Revo-
lution, and Fantasy in Egypt,” in our January number, Charles Issawi was incorrectly desig-
nated. as an “Egyptian economist.” Mr. Issawi
is an Arab but not Egyptian.