Anne Frank's cats
There are four cats that Anne Frank mentions in her Diary: Moortje, Mouschi, Moffie (Boche) and Tommy.
Moortje
Moortje was Anne Frank's cat that she had to leave with neighbours (who Anne refers to as "Toosje K.") when she went into hiding with her family to escape [...] persecution of Jews on July 6, 1942. Anne said that Moortje was female in a letter but others contradict this. The Frank family first got Moortje in early 1942. Several people, including Anne's friends Jacqueline van Maarsen and Eva Geiringer commented on the fact that Moortje was an exceptionally good-natured cat that loved to be picked up and cuddled, and Van Maarsen remarks in the Anne Frank biography Roses From the Earth that Moortje would even placidly accept tub baths from Anne, remarkable for any cat.
Moortje is a traditional Dutch name for black cats. Miep Gies, in her book "Anne Frank Remembered", says that the cat the family had when Anne was only eight or nine years old was also named "Moortje". Possibly it was, though Gies does state in her preface that she remembers these events of "more than fifty years ago" to the best of her recollection. Gies also describes the Frank family as "cat people", and admired a charcoal drawing of a mother cat and her two kittens displayed in the Frank home. Many years later, Otto Frank made a present of this charcoal drawing to Miep Gies, herself a cat lover.
Anne makes several references to Moortje in her diary including in her very first entry in the diary on 12 June 1942:
- "On Friday, June 12, I woke up at six o'clock, and no wonder; it was my birthday. But of course I was not allowed to get up at that hour, so I had to contain my curiosity until a quarter to seven. Then I could bear it no longer, and went to the dining room, where I received A Warm Welcome from Moortje (the cat)."
Anne wrote AbOUT the day the Frank family went into hiding (and the day she left Moortje behind):
- "At seven-thirty we too closed the door behind us; Moortje, my cat, was the only living creature I said good-bye to. According to a note we left for Mr. Gouldschmidt, she was to be taken to the neighbours, who would give her a good home." - written 8 July 1942 about events that happened on 6 July 1942.
One month later she writes in her diary about how much she is missing Moortje:
- "I miss Moortje every moment of the day and no one knows how often I think of her; whenever I think of her I get tears in my eyes."
- "Moortje is such a darling and I love her so much, I dream up all sorts of plans in which she comes back again..." - 12 July 1942.
And later in the year:
- "There's always a tiny black cat roaming around the yard, and it reminds me of my dear sweet Moortje." - 1 October 1942.
And in a comment added much later:
- "I can also understand my homesickness and yearning for Moortje. The whole time I've been here I've longed unconsciously and at times consciously for trust, love and physical affection. This longing may change in intensity, but it's always there." - 22 January 1944.
Other cats
Anne Frank's diary makes mention of three other cats:
- Mouschi - a stray young male cat brought into the Secret Annexe by Peter van Pels. Mouschi is mentioned in the stories The Flea and Villains! both in the collection Anne Frank's Tales from the Secret Annex by Anne Frank though in this collection the cat is GeneRally regarded as the van Daan (pseudonym for van Pels) family's cat rather than just Peter's cat.
- Moffie - a warehouse cat, also male, described by Miep Gies as a "big, fat black-and-white tomcat with a slightly battered face." According to Miep: "A Moffen was a biscuit in the shape of a fat little pig. … our cat was known to steal food from other houses in the neighborhood, just as the Germans were doing with our food." The Dutch used the term Moffen to refer to the Germans. In English translations of the diary, this cat is called Boche (a French First World War nickname for the Germans) though Anne never used this name. Early translations struggled to find an adequate translation for Moffie. Moffie disappears during the Frank family's time in the Annexe.
- Tommy - (again a nickname - after Tommy representing the British), who used to have fights with Boche and had run away before Anne had even began her diary.
Though her entire family loved cats, Anne herself also loved dogs. The entertainment at Anne's 13th birthday party was a rented silent film, projected on the living room wall by her father, titled "The Lighthouse by the Sea", starring Rin-Tin-Tin. In an early diary entry, Anne reflects on how she would like to have a dog like Rin-Tin-Tin.
See also
- Anne Frank House
Bibliography
- The Diary of Anne Frank: the Revised Critical Edition - ISBN 0-385-50847-6
- Anne Frank Remembered: the Story of the Woman who Helped to Hide the Frank Family, by Miep Gies with Alison Leslie Gold - ISBN 0-671-66234-1
- The Footsteps of Anne Frank by Ernst Schnabel, R. Winston (Translator), C. Winston (Translator) - ISBN 0-330-02996-7
- Anne Frank: A Biography by Melissa Muller, Rita Kimber (Translator), Robert Kimber (Translator) - ISBN 0-7475-4523-5
- Roses from the Earth: Biography of Anne Frank by Carol Ann Lee - ISBN 0-14-027628-9
- Anne and Jopie by Jacqueline van Maarsen