How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
"But in that case," he said, speaking the words as the thought came to him, "all art is love, because all art is about looking closely, isn't it. Looking closely at what's being painted.' 'The artist looking closely while he paints, the viewer looking closely at what has been painted. I agree. All true art, yes. Painting. Writing—literature—also. I think it is. And bad art is a failure to observe with complete attention. So, you see why I like the history of art. It's the study of how to observe life with complete attention. It's the history of love." (8.62)
In the gallery, Daan and Jacob decide that art is just like love, because the artist has to connect with the person s/he's creating. This is just about the most concise description we get of why art is so important to these guys: it's an expression of love.
Quote #8
"And you know how she wanted to be a famous writer? Well, she started rewriting her diary not long before she was captured because she heard a broadcast by one of the Dutch ministers. He said he wanted everyone to save letters and diaries and things like that, things they had written during the occupation, and after the war they would collect these together and put them into a national library so that in future people would be able to read what it was actually like for ordinary people during the war, and not just have to rely on books by professional historians." (14.57)
Jacob tells Tessel that he loves Anne Frank because she's just a regular old gal, just like us. It's not that he loves a story about the war or the history of it; he's invested in the personal experience of it all, from the perspective of a kid.
Quote #9
When he was not reading to me, we talked of books we loved. Jacob told me of English writers and books I had never heard of but which, after the war, I found and read for myself. And I told him of our Dutch writers I admired most. We sang to each other the popular songs we knew. (17.15)
Even with war raging outside their door, Geertrui and Jacob talk about literature. For them, it's a form of escape from their current world because it offers something more—something they can't find hiding the German-occupied Holland.