| Second edition (1947) | |
|---|---|
| Author | Viktor E. Frankl |
| Original title | Ein Psychologe erlebt das Konzentrationslager |
| Translator | Ilse Lasch (Part One) |
| Country | Austria |
What is the title of the book Man's Search for meaning?
The book's common full English title is Man's Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy, although this subtitle is often not printed on the cover of modern editions. This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources.
Why is man’s search for meaning so important?
With these words, Viktor E. Frankl summed up the basic thought of his book, Man’s Search for Meaning. It is for this reason that finding your why, your purpose, your reason for being, is so important. It will carry you through any trial, even when those trials seem completely overwhelming to the exclusion of all else.
How many copies of Man's Search for meaning have been sold?
According to a survey conducted by the Book-of-the-Month Club and the Library of Congress, Man's Search for Meaning belongs to a list of "the ten most influential books in the United States." At the time of the author's death in 1997, the book had sold over 10 million copies and had been translated into 24 languages.
How do you find meaning in life?
You can find meaning in work (by doing something significant), in love (by caring for another person), and in courage during difficult times. A fascinating read. Life is not a quest for pleasure, but for meaning. The 3 possible sources for meaning:
Where did Frankl write Man's Search for meaning?
The Will To Meaning For example, when Frankl first arrived at Auschwitz, his nearly complete manuscript was taken from him. He would often visualize what this manuscript looked like, and write it over and over again in his head. This was just one way in which he found some meaning despite his circumstances.
When did Viktor Frankl write Man's Search for meaning?
1946This book, Frankl's first, was published in 1946 in German, and in 1955 it was published in English with the title The Doctor and the Soul. The first version of Man's Search for Meaning, the book for which Frankl is most widely known, was also published in 1946, after Medical Ministry/The Doctor and the Soul.
What is the purpose of man's search for meaning?
Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning provides a vivid account of an individual's experience as a prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp. The book focuses on love, hope, responsibility, inner freedom, and the beauty to be found in both nature and art as means that help one endure and overcome harrowing experiences.
When did Beacon Press publish Man's Search for meaning?
Winslade. Man's Search for Meaning. Boston: Beacon Press, 2006.
What concentration camps was Viktor Frankl?
Frankl spent a total of three years in four camps: Theresienstadt, Auschwitz, Kaufering III, and Türkheim. He lost his father in the Terezín Ghetto, his brother and mother at Auschwitz, and his wife in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. His sister, Stella, escaped to Australia.
What does Viktor Frankl claim is the purpose of life?
According to Frankl, “the meaning of life is to be discovered in the world rather than within man or his own psyche, as though it were a closed system.
How did Viktor Frankl find meaning?
For Frankl, meaning came from three possible sources: purposeful work, love, and courage in the face of difficulty. In examining the “intensification of inner life” that helped prisoners stay alive, he considers the transcendental power of love: Love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved.
What was Viktor Frankl's theory?
Viktor Frankl While struggling to survive in the Nazi camp, drawing from his experiences as well as observations, he developed the theory of logotherapy which claimed that through a search for meaning in life, individuals can endure and overcome suffering.
What does SS mean in man's search for meaning?
In Man's Search for Meaning, the capos were prisoners who were chosen by the SS guards to oversee other prisoners. These privileged individuals were picked for their sadistic qualities and could often be just as brutal as the SS.
What genre is man's search for meaning?
BiographyMan's Search for Meaning / GenreA biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Wikipedia
Is Man's Search for Meaning nonfiction?
Man's Search For Meaning, written by psychiatrist Viktor E. Frankl, is a classic Holocaust memoir and treatise which chronicles the author's experience in concentration camps, as well as the experiences of the patients he treated after the war.
Who wrote Man's Search for Meaning?
In Man’s Search for Meaning, psychiatrist and neurologist Viktor Frankl (1905-1997) wrote about his ordeal as a concentration camp inmate during the Second World War.
What is the term for the dejection that many people feel at the end of the working week?
Frankl is credited with coining the term "Sunday neurosis " to refer to the dejection that many people feel at the end of the working week when at last they have the time to realize just how empty and meaningless their life has become.
What is Frankl's message?
Frankl’s message is ultimately one of hope: even in the most absurd, painful, and dispiriting of circumstances, life can be given a meaning, and so too can suffering.
What is the meaning of Man's Search for Meaning?
In Man’s Search for Meaning, Viktor Frankl tells his story of surviving a concentration camp and how this experience led to his theory on the importance of meaning in one’s life (Logotherapy). You can find meaning in work (by doing something significant), in love (by caring for another person), and in courage during difficult times.
How do we discover meaning in life?
Self-actualization is possible only as a side-effect of self-transcendence. We can discover meaning in life in 3 ways: By creating a work or doing a deed.
What is the salvation of man?
The salvation of man is through love and in love. Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms —to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. When a man finds that it is his destiny to suffer, he will have to accept his suffering as his task.
What does "life is not a quest for pleasure" mean?
The 3 possible sources for meaning: You cannot control what happens to you in life, but you can always control what you will feel and do about what happens to you. Love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire.
What does love mean?
The Meaning of Love. Love is the only way to grasp another human being in the innermost core of his personality. By his love, the loving person enables the beloved person to actualize these potentialities. By making him aware of what he can be and of what he should become, he makes these potentialities come true.
What did Frankl do during his time?
During Frankl’s time, he would spend some time talking to prisoners and attempt to help them balance their mental health.
What does "when we are no longer able to change a situation" mean?
2. When we are no longer able to change a situation we are challenged to change ourselves. Control what you can control my friend. If it’s something you can modify then go ahead and do it, if you can’t.. then please change yourself. 3. We cannot avoid suffering, but can choose to find a meaning within it and move forward. ...
Overview
Man's Search for Meaning is a 1946 book by Viktor Frankl chronicling his experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during World War II, and describing his psychotherapeutic method, which involved identifying a purpose in life to feel positive about, and then immersively imagining that outcome. According to Frankl, the way a prisoner imagined the future affected his longevity. The book intends to answer the question "How was everyday life in a concentration camp reflect…
Editions
The book's original title is Ein Psychologe erlebt das Konzentrationslager ("A Psychologist Experiences the Concentration Camp"). Later German editions prefixed the title with Trotzdem Ja zum Leben Sagen ("Nevertheless Say Yes to Life"), taken from a line in Das Buchenwaldlied, a song written by Dr. Friedrich Löhner-Beda while an inmate at Buchenwald. The title of the first English-language translation was From Death-Camp to Existentialism. The book's common full E…
Experiences in a concentration camp
Frankl identifies three psychological reactions experienced by all inmates to one degree or another: (1) shock during the initial admission phase to the camp, (2) apathy after becoming accustomed to camp existence, in which the inmate values only that which helps himself and his friends survive, and (3) reactions of depersonalization, moral deformity, bitterness, and disillusionment if he survives and is liberated.
Reception
The book has been identified as one of the most influential books in the United States. At the time of Frankl's death in 1997, the book had sold over 10 million copies and had been translated into 24 languages.
However, aspects of the book have garnered criticism. One of Frankl's main claims in the book is that a positive attitude was essential to surviving the camps. Consequently, he implied and thus h…
See also
• Existential anxiety
• Maslow's hierarchy of needs
• Statue of Responsibility – proposed in the book to complement the Statue of Liberty
• Life Is Beautiful (1997), film on how a positive attitude can be maintained in the worst of circumstances, including a concentration camp
External links
• Viktor Frankl: Why believe in others TED talk
• Commentary on Man's Search For Meaning by personal development scholar Tom Butler-Bowdon (50 Self-Help Classics, 2003. ISBN 978-1857883237)
• Viktor Frankl at Ninety: An Interview