Anne Frank began to keep a diary only a short time before her family went into hiding, and she chronicled her experiences until August 4, 1944, when she and the others were taken away by the Gestapo. Otto Frank was given his daughter's diary after the war ended and the concentration camps had been liberated. At the urging of friends, he published Anne's diary in Holland in 1947. The Diary of Anne Frank has since become an international classic.

Zlata's Diary: A Child's Life in Sarajevo (1995) is eleven-year-old Zlata Filipovic's diary describing her life in Sarajevo. Begun in 1992, before war broke out, Zlata's diary turns from daily activities to the hardships and deprivations of living under siege.

Thomas Keneally's Schindler's List (1993) is a work of fiction based on the true-life story of Oskar Schindler, a German industrialist who sheltered and employed Jews in...