Synopsis: As an idealistic first-year English teacher at Wilson High School in Long Beach, California, Erin Gruwell confronted a room of ‘unteachable, at-risk’ students. One day she intercepted a note with an ugly racial caricature and angrily declared that this was precisely the sort of thing that led to the Holocaust – only to be met by uncomprehending looks. So she and her students, using the treasured books Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl and Zlata’s Diary: A Child’s Life in Sarajevo as their guides, undertook a life-changing, eye-opening, spirit-raising odyssey against intolerance and misunderstanding. They learned to see the parallels in these books to their own lives, recording their thoughts and feelings in diaries and dubbing themselves ‘The Freedom Writers’ in homage to the civil rights activists ‘The Freedom Riders’.

Review: The Freedom Writers Diary is an engaging and thought-provoking book that delves into the lives, secrets and inner emotions of a group of teenagers living amongst an ‘undeclared war’ where racism and intolerance leads to violence. With shocking entries from students as they remember the violence they have witnessed, the friends and family they have mourned and the abuse they have suffered, this book will touch all who read it with its courage, vitality and determination. The reader undergoes the journey of Erin Gruwell’s students as they struggle along their paths which leads them from failing teenagers with bleak futures to graduates heading for college, jobs and a happier life in which they are committed to helping make the world a better place.

The Freedom Writers' Diary is an uplifting, unforgettable example of how hard work, courage, and the spirit of determination changed the lives of a teacher and her students. One hopes that their message will ring true and loud throughout the world.

2007-06-12