BOOKPATHS

Amsterdam, Netherlands

City-Lit series publisher Malcolm Burgess chooses "10 of the best books set in Amsterdam."

Anne Frank House – Museum, Prinsengracht 267, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

The Anne Frank House honors the young girl whose diary is known worldwide by telling the “history of the eight people in hiding and those who helped them during the war.  Anne Frank’s diary is among the original objects on display.”  Written while she was in hiding, her diary was left behind when a Nazi raid on the house sent Anne and her family first to Westerbork and then to Bergen-Belsen where she and her sister died of typhus in 1945.  When her father, Otto Frank, an Auschwitz survivor, returned to Amsterdam, he was given Anne’s diary.   Published in 1947, The Diary of Anne Frank has never gone out of print.

The Anne Frank Museum is open daily, except on certain holidays – July and August, 9:00 – 10:00 p.m.; March 15 – June and September 1-14, 9:00 a.m. – 9:00 p.m., Saturdays, 9:00 a.m. – 10:00 p.m.; September 15 through March 14, 9:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m..  For additional information, visit the Anne Frank House website.

I see the eight of us with our 'Secret Annexe' as if we were a little piece of blue heaven, surrounded by heavy black rain clouds. The round, clearly defined spot where we stand is still safe, but the clouds gather more closely about us and the circle which separates us from the approaching danger closes more and more tightly. Now we are so surrounded by danger and darkness that we bump against each other, as we search desperately for a means of escape. We all look down below, where people are fighting each other, we look above, where it is quiet and beautiful, and meanwhile we are cut off by the great dark mass, which will not let us go upwards, but which stands before us as an impenetrable wall; it tries to crush us, but cannot do so yet. I can only cry and implore: 'Oh, if only the black circle could recede and open the way for us!' – from The Diary of Anne Frank

Amsterdam, Netherlands

Sarah Ream writes about Amsterdam, “literature’s capital city.”

“On April 23, World Book and Copyright Day, Amsterdam will be officially inaugurated as World Book Capital 2008. The ensuing year-long programme of events centres around an 'open book' theme, a reminder that Amsterdam's infamous tolerance doesn't just equate to legal coffeeshops and brothels - rather, it was vital in the city's development as a refuge for the written word.” – from “Amsterdam: Literature’s Capital City,” by Sarah Ream, The Guardian

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Alan Riding takes New York Times’ readers on a walk “among the shadows of Rembrandt’s life in Amsterdam.”

“Strolling beside Amsterdam's oldest canals, where buildings carry dates like 1541 and 1603, it is easy to imagine the city's prosperity in the 17th century. Replace today's bicycles and cars with horse-drawn carts, add more barges on the waterways, and this is essentially how Amsterdam must have looked to Rembrandt as he did his rounds of wealthy merchants.” -- from “Walking Among the Shadows of Rembrandt’s Life in Amsterdam,” by Alan Riding, New York Times