Summary and Analysis of Man's Search for Meaning

Based on the Book by Victor E. Frankl

Worth Books

• Publisher: Worth Books
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781504046770
• eBook ISBN: 9781504044158
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• Index: Social Sciences

So much to read, so little time? This brief overview of  Man's Search for Meaning tells you what you need to know—before or after you read Viktor E. Frankl's book.
 
Crafted and edited with care, Worth Books set the standard for quality and give you the tools you need to be a well-informed reader.
 
This short summary and analysis of Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl includes:

• Historical context
• Chapter-by-chapter summaries
• Important quotes
• Fascinating trivia
• Glossary of terms
• Supporting material to enhance your understanding of the original work

 
About Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl:
 
Written just after World War II, Viktor Frankl's international bestseller Man's Search for Meaning is both a heartbreaking memoir and a source of inspiration for millions of readers.
 
Dr. Frankl's description of his time in a string of Nazi concentration camps is a fascinating, mandatory read for anyone wanting a better understanding of the Holocaust. A highly respected psychotherapist, his ideas on human emotion, the mind, mental health, tragic optimism, and the day-to-day neuroses of common people in the modern world provide spiritual guidance as each of us searches for meaning in our own lives.
 
The summary and analysis in this ebook are intended to complement your reading experience and bring you closer to a great work of nonfiction.

Summary

I. Experiences in a Concentration Camp

Frankl begins with the institutional brutality of his own entry into the camps: the formal orderliness with which Nazi officials organized transport, admission, regulation, and control of the prisoners. The processing of prisoners—giving them numbers, dividing them up into random groups, stripping them naked, beating them, selecting privileged capos, setting them to work from early in the morning to late in the day, and starving them—in Frankl’s estimation was a way of depriving people of their connections to others and to their own lives and histories. As a manner of control, this was very effective. People were too frightened, alienated, and intent on surviving to even consider resistance. The Nazis projected an image of total control and order, and an essential part of this was weakening and disempowering their prisoners.

Thoughts of suicide, fear of death, and brutal working conditions kept the prisoners down, but Frankl recounts moments where human behavior seemed to run counter to what was—and often still is—popularly thought about human psychology. Some obedient prisoners were selected by the Nazis and became capos—helpers and orderlies of the regime—but more often, prisoners would help strangers in the camp at great risk to themselves.

On his second day at Auschwitz, Frankl was approached by a man who broke the rules, risking death, by sneaking out to his hut to offer advice on how to survive in the camp. This deed was entirely selfless and also completely unnecessary, as it did little to help either party in the end.

Though suicide was possible—all one had to do was “run into the wire,” the highly electrified fence surrounding the camp—few people actually killed themselves. And though many of those who repressed thoughts of suicide were still murdered, a small minority of survivors continued to take great risks for others and to find ways of maintaining calm, levelheadedness, and some optimism. Frankl found these cases the most interesting.

To understand better, Frankl broke the experience up into a few loose phases. The first phase was one of an ironic curiosity. Most inmates, subject to such hopelessness, moved into a state of removed curiosity as to how much pain they could take and whether they would survive. With the elimination of personal agency, it seemed that, initially, the intellectual mind took over and found itself stimulated to see what would happen next. How long could a person go without sleep? How long could a person stand out in two-degree weather without boots or a coat?

The brief first phase was then followed by a phase of apathy and a permanent and total lack of libido. Frankl viewed these characteristics as central symptoms of imprisonment. Prisoners began to view death and suffering as just another part of the day, unremarkable for the camps. Frankl too fell into this behavior, often viewing the body of a friend who died right in front of him or watching people ransack a dead body for a coat, shoes, and other possessions without the slightest reaction. He also had very few sexual thoughts and was reduced, essentially, to a state of physical and libidinal anhedonia or disinterest. These responses were characteristics of psychological self-defense and were necessary for survival. To feel, see, and live as normal in the camp was impossible, so in order to make it through the ordeal, the human mind naturally withdrew to a state of moral, physical, and emotional apathy.

Frankl discusses what he calls “cultural hibernation” and the importance of a rich inner life. The belief systems and culture of the prisoners were largely absent during internment, but Frankl writes that there were often heady discussions of a political, academic, or religious nature. This led him to some insights about the importance of intellectual lives for human beings. He remarks that the biggest and healthiest prisoners would often perish sooner than those with slighter constitutions who had rich intellectual lives. Inner peace and a desire to find meaning—through literature, science, theology, etc.—even when confronted with violence and chaos, was central not only to survival, but also to finding meaning in one’s life. Frankl refers to his own knowledge of literature to aid his understanding of the range of human responses to the anguish. He quotes Lessing, “There are things which must cause you to lose your reason or you have none to lose,” and Dostoevsky: “Yes, man can get used to anything, but do not ask how.”

Thoughts of poetry, literature, and science helped Frankl to understand himself and the world around him and led to one of his central revelations. During a particularl...

Table of contents

• Title
• Disclaimer
• Contents
• Context
• Overview
• Summary
• Timeline
• Direct Quotes and Analysis
• Trivia
• What’s That Word?
• Critical Response
• About Viktor E. Frankl
• For Your Information
• Bibliography
• Copyright