A Classic | Man's Search for Meaning

Powerful, Sobering, Inspiring | Man's Search for Meaning | Viktor E. Frankl

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	• Man's Search for Meaning Viktor E. Frankl Beacon Press, 2000 - 196 pages average customer review:based on 456 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Great Book

I had bought this book several years ago after it was referenced in several other books I was reading. The last couple of copies were given away to people that seemed to need to read what this book illustrates. I went looking for it on my bookshelves a few months back, and remembered that I had given the last one away, so I had to order another one. After looking for it in commercial chain bookstores, and having them tell me that they'd have to order it, I figured that I'd save them the time and trouble, and just order it myself.

A Classic

The message in this book is timeless. Nearly every page offers a profound quote to use as a personal motto for life.

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Powerful, Sobering, Inspiring

This book is an unforgettable piece of writing. It is written by Viktor Frankl, a concentration camp survivor, psychiatrist, and founder of logotherapy. In a clear, true, voice he quickly entrains the reader into the reality of the camps; the hierarchies, the realities, and the will to live that will allow humans to endure and participate in almost anything. Yet with the depravity he also writes of the few who shone- who cared for others; who did not abandon spiritual principles. This amazing first-person account is unforgettable because of his bravery, intellectual approach, and clear-headed ability to recount details. Dr. Frankl also shares the core principles behind his innovative approach to psychotherapy. We are all searching for meaning; reading this book will allow you to look at life in a new way and you will be changed forever. A life-changing and extraordinary book.

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Perhaps the most valuable book of the 20th Century

Excluding scientific achievements and their documentation, no other short book presents the gifts of the twentieth century as perfectly as Frankl's work.

Man's Search for Meaning, or ISM for the modern substitution of "An Individual's" for "Man's," gives the extreme twisted side of human organization with its autobiography of a holocaust survivor, but balances it with the strongest statement possible not against the horror, but against determinism: humans always have the freedom to choose their response. Furthermore, the text is written with the direct, yet respectful words, for the twisted, but not fixed, timber of human life exemplified in the intelligent style of Freud, Jung, and Adler - a mid-century style not commonly written anymore, a style that assumes that a reader not only has worked to develop a humane education, but is also willing to work to improve it.

The main thrust of Frankl is that humans strive to make meaning of their lives first and foremost. This updates Freud's statements that humans seek pleasure primarily or Adler's statements that people seek power. The job of a psychoanalyst (a quaint word today) is to use logotherapy (a set of approaches initiated by Frankl) to help patients solve their problems, internally and externally, by finding their meaning. Obviously Frankl fits within the resolving existentialism tide of the twentieth century. He complements the texts of Isaiah Berlin which also focus on the meaning of freedom within the constraints of humans as they are and the societies in which they live.

If only considered responses to Frankl by stoics such as Seneca and Aurelius were possible. A dialogue across time - which a reader can form - places many of the travails of history as being those of humans within history resolving their search for meaning, a seeking also inherent within most readers. This segues into seeing history not just through the lens of great events and powers, but through the experiences of everyone, not just elites.

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Just read it

I came to this book in a round-about way - it was recommended in the book A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future in the chapter on "Meaning". In "A Whole New Mind" the author, Daniel Pink, has come up with six senses that are important to develop one's mind in a Conceptual Age and "meaning" is one of the them. The idea that we have to read a book to realize that we have to develop meaning in our lives seems pathetic. But nevertheless, I was intrigued by Pink's description of "Man's Search for Meaning" and read it immediately after reading "A Whole New Mind". Surprisingly I had never heard of "Man's Search for Meaning" nor its author Victor Frankl even though its afterword states that it has sold 12 million copies in 24 languages and in a 1991 "Book of the Month" survey was voted among the 10 most influential books by readers.

The book is the story of Frankl's experience as a prisoner in various concentration camps during World War II. Before being arrested, he was working on a manuscript about his psychological theories (he had been a practicing psychiatrist in Vienna). Though his wife sewed the manuscript in his coat, it was soon confiscated in the camp; he proceeded to practice his theory of searching for meaning despite his bleak situation and he also tried to recreate the manuscript on scraps of paper. Despite the grim and horrible scenes described by Frankl, you will be amazed by his outlook on life and how he just kept going. There is no doubt that his survival was aided by his firm belief in the importance of finding meaning in life (in ANY situation). He was also lucky and resourceful. When he was liberated from camp, he wrote the entire book in 9 days.

At the end of the book is an essay on his theory of logotherapy which is a very practical outlook on addressing many psychological problems. He states that "man's main concern is not to gain pleasure or to avoid pain but rather to see a meaning in his life." He says that life has no inherent meaning but rather a unique meaning exists for each person which he has a responsibility to discover. The meaning can be discovered in 3 ways:
1) By creating a work or doing a deed
2) By experiencing something or encountering someone
3) By the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering (though suffering is NOT a prerequisite for discovering meaning)
His theory is much more than a theory since it was so effectively put into practice by him and the people he counseled. His theory is given much more weight by his life story (he lost both his parents and his pregnant wife in the camps). This is a short book that bears reading multiple times.

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With more than 4 million copies in print in the English language alone, Man's Search for Meaning, the chilling yet inspirational story of Viktor Frankl's struggle to hold on to hope during his three years as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps, is a true classic. Beacon Press is now pleased to present a special gift edition of a work that was hailed in 1959 by Carl Rogers as "one of the outstanding contributions to psychological thought in the last fifty years." Frankl's training as a psychiatrist informed every waking moment of his ordeal and allowed him a remarkable perspective on the psychology of survival. His assertion that "the will to meaning" is the basic motivation for human life has forever changed the way we understand our humanity in the face of suffering.

"If you read but one book this year, Dr. Frankl's book should be that one." ?Los Angeles Times
"A compelling introduction to the most significant psychological movement of our day." ?Gordon W. Allport, from the Preface

"An enduring work of survival literature." ?The New York Times

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