A rare handwritten poem by Anne Frank, known to millions through the diary she kept while hiding from the Nazis during World War II, was sold Wednesday at auction for 140,000 euros ($148,000) in the Netherlands. Frank was 12 years old when she wrote the eight-line poem, dated March 28, 1942, in the "friendship book" of Christiane "Cri-Cri" van Maarsen, the older sister of Frank's best friend, Jacqueline van Maarsen, according to auction house Bubb Kuyper in the city of Haarlem. The auction house had valued the rare example of Frank's handwriting and signature at 30,000 euros ($32,000). The first four lines, which have been identified as coming from a magazine, encourage Van Maarsen to work harder at school. The second four, which may have been crafted by Frank herself, say that the best answer to critics is to do a better job. Christiane van Maarsen died in 2006. Her sister Jacqueline, who is still alive, was in the same class at school with Frank. She said in a note published by the auction house she was selling the poem because it had not been important to Christiane. Frank kept a diary during the two years she and her family hid in a tiny secret apartment above a warehouse in Amsterdam before they were arrested by the Germans in August 1944 and deported. Anne died at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp weeks before it was liberated in 1945. Her diary was preserved and has become one the most important documents to emerge from the Holocaust.
