Anne Frank - should people have heard about her?

[MilkTrayLimeBarrel]

Chatting with DH about where to go for a city break this spring. I suggested Amsterdam - lots to see, including tulips, canals, bikes and Anne Frank's house. He asked who she was? AIBU to think that everybody should have heard of her and what she stood for/did? I couldn't believe that he honestly had no idea who she was!

Good grief! Yes absolutely at that age he should have heard of her.

I find that astounding. To not know about her, or indeed John Lennon, is unusual, but not to have even heard about them is beyond belief.
At Christmas, an old friend came to stay and it transpired she had never heard of cliff Richard. We're the same age, both in our 40s, always lived in the UK. I was .

I think some people are able to conciously or unconsciously turn off the part of their brains that causes sparks in interest.

That is surprising

Unless he has spent his life to date in a cave (which I assume he hasn't) I am stunned he hasn't even heard of her!

The world wars have been studied in schools for years and Anne Frank is a part of that.

all the more reason to go & word to wise - I tried to book ahead & couldn't but the hotel told me to go on line in the morning I wanted to go & book because they release times than. Also nearly opposite the station in Amsterdam there is a tourist information office you can book al sorts of trips there we booked a trip to the Keukenhof Gardens check on tripadvisor for best time to visit it was fantastic! Oh public loos (important!!) there is one near the back of the station shopping area & another in the tourist office just mentioned - we went to Amsterdam on the Kings Birthday when everyone gets dressed in orange & celebrates (well oiled but happy!) on the canals & on the streets - we didn't know this went on but dh was pleased (he needs camera surgically removed after holidays).

I mean, even Justin Beiber knows who Anne Frank is

I'm not convinced

I did history O'Level and our syllabus was based round WW2. Not a mention of her yet we all knew about her. I don't know how. In Auschwitz in the middle of the cabinets with all the suitcases, the one in the middle is marked M Frank (her sister Margot) which is chilling (as if the place isn't chilling enough).

If 99.9% of UK people have heard of her, that's 66,000 that haven't. So yes it is surprising when it's your partner but there you go!

If you're from Western Europe, the USA or Israel it would perhaps be unusual not to have heard of her but given he's in his fifties it probably wasn't on the curriculum then. I'm a similar age and my mum told me about her but we didn't look at the diary in school or anything. We studied WWII at A level, not before, and Anne Frank certainly didn't feature in that: it was more about how important the Russians were in defeating Germany (something that, incidentally, a lot of people don't seem to realise, although they know about Anne Frank and they've seen Private Ryan, so ...) Everyone has different knowledge. As a pp said there are presumably things he knows about that you don't. It all balances out, usually.

11yr old DD knows who she is.

I'm not sure everyone learnt about her at school though. 1980's secondary education was pretty hit and miss. I learnt about her from the tv.

She was on our school curriculum in the 80's. But in terms of visiting Amsterdam you need to book AFH in advance as it gets very busy and tickets are v limited

But why should he have heard of her? What is it about her particular story which makes it (apparently) mandatory knowledge for every adult in the world ever?

I'm not saying she's not hugely significant because she is - to Western Europe. And yes, it is unusual for someone educated in the UK to not have heard of her.

But no-one can know everything, and that doesn't make someone ignorant.

I could look askance at my colleagues when they say they've never heard of Gustav Klimt (this has actually happened) and call them ignorant idiots, and my friend might patronise me because I don't know how to work simple formulas in Excel. But we don't because sometimes people just don't know stuff. I have a very bright friend who can run rings around me when discussing archaeological theory but who didn't realise narwhals weren't mythical until she was 24.

SueEllen yeah sorry that was a bit sexist wasn't it?
puds11 I felt a bit sorry for Justin Bieber when he was criticised for saying Anne would of been a fan - but I reckon she would of been. She was totally into Hollywood movie stars and celebrity and royal gossip. If Heat magazine had existed then she would of been begging Miep for old copies.

I’m 50s and Scottish and we did her story at school.

early 50s, European?

i suppose someone very poorly educated, who lacked any intellectual curiosity, never read books, broadsheets or listened to the news or documentaries, radio, might not have heard of her.

@RB68 no you don't if you cant book ahead you can get tickets on day we did this & only found out you can do this from our hotel (& it was our last day & we were due to fly late that evening) we got a time of midday ish which was brilliant as it gave us enough time to have a last wander round go to Anne Frank House have lunch & get back to hotel & than go to the airport!

Just my mid-50s dh and teen dc and they both know who she is.

Not knowing something because it's not on the curriculum is nonsense. Surely, most of what we know comes from a natural desire for knowledge. Don't most of us have that?

You hear something, you ask about it or work it out or find out for yourself. There's no excuse when we can search for everything on the Internet.

I understand that you may ignore something that is of no interest to you, but to live through life not knowing who Anne Frank is is bizarre.

Would he have never seen a programme advertised, her book, her picture, and wondered who she was. I suppose that is the definition ignorance.

We didn't do anything about the world wars in history either I did my GCSE,s in 1990 and we covered the agricultural and industrial revolution , I have read the book though , and I remember the BBC did a dramatization on the 80,s or early 90,s it was one of those Sunday evening ones .

I also recall doing the story of Helen Keller. The blind deaf and speechless lady who was overjoyed to learn sign language if I recall correctly.

Op, does your DH have European heritage? I can imagine people in their early 50s who are from the middle East, Africa or Asia not knowing her story. But otherwise? it seems highly unusual.

x2boys
I remember learning about the industrial and agricultural revolution!!!! Thanks for the reminder.

@Lockheart I dunno why she's become such a touchstone. I suppose people would rather think of her as being frozen in time somehow, forever writing her witty, tetchy, awkwardly self examining diary, than consider what happened to her in the end. It's a story we can even tell to children about the war - a little girl like you, hiding from the bad men - although we gloss over the unwritten final chapter. A couple of generations doing that gives it more power, maybe?

Lol @RingPiece I expect you know all about four field crop rotation than!

Did he go through the English school system?

I’m mid 40s and learned about her at school