In her diary entry for October 9, 1942 Anne Frank wrote

But that's not the end of my lamentations. Have you ever heard the term "hostages"? That's the latest punishment for saboteurs. It's the most horrible thing you can imagine. Leading citizens - innocent people - are taken prisoner to await execution. If the Gestapo can't find the saboteur, they simply grab five hostages and line them up against the wall.

One of the things that strikes me about reading this book as an adult is the juxtaposition between's Anne's more or less ordinary middle class life prior to and even during the war, and the events that overtook her, as well as between what she accepts as ordinary v. what I do. Here, for instance; was hostage so rarely used around a thirteen year-old girl in the Netherlands in 1942? (Or is it just as used in reference to the specific practive she outlined?)

There's some essential paradox about life during times of crisis here, but I don't know how to talk about it.