I am currently reading “Mans search for meaning” by Dr. Frankl:
So, maybe i am just reading wrong or there are other reasons on my half that lead to me not understanding it or maybe its simply because i am not a native english speaker and i shoud’ve bought this book in my language instead.
I get that he is talking about how his life was in the concentration camp everyday and how they had a very harsh life during that time.
Sick men “moslems” were burned immediatly upon arrival, while the fit men were used by the SS till their very last bite of physical capability to do anything. They were only given a piece of bread per day (if they were lucky, sometimes they wouldnt get anything) and they were starving so bad till you could practically see no sign of muscle and fat on them anymore. There were also the so called capos which were sort of preferred by the SS men and were very alike. The Capos would “bully” the normal prisoners and had more advantages over them, such as more food per day for instance.
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The prisoners had three psychological reactions according to Dr. Frankl.
* Admission: Their mind ept having a sense of hope that they will be spared. That life wouldn’t be as harsh there. Their mind tried to comfort the prisoner. A few hours later reality would set in and they would realise how f…ed they actually are. This process of understanding their harsh reality would lead to alot of sensations coming up like for instance curiousity or humour.
* Relative Apathy: The prisoner would sort of emotionally die. What was absolute horror to them, like their fellow prisoners getting beaten, be it young or old.. Dead bodies and so on, wouldnt bother them at all. For instance: Dr. Frankl made direct eye contact with a corpse while sipping on his soup. Two hours before he had spoken to that man who was now dead. It didnt bother him at all and he continued sipping his soup like nothing happened.
* Liberation and Disillusionment: I am not there yet.
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This is all that i got till now and for me it seems that i didnt get alot of other important facts.
by Significant-Goal-239
12 Comments
It seems like you’re already getting a good handle on the subject. The Holocaust is a difficult subject to study, mentally and emotionally. Be prepared to read this book more than once, and not back to back. Read it. Let it sit for a good long while and think about it. Read other books on the Holocaust. Come back to this one and read it again, see if you gain a deeper understanding.
I haven’t read this particular book but what you’re getting out of it is very much in line from what I learned from other sources.
From your headline I thought you might be struggling with the vocabulary and Philosophical approach to the topic but you are getting it exactly right.
Elie Wiesel Night or Primo Levi If This is a Man or Corrie Ten Boom the Hiding Place are concentration camp memoirs written in ways that are not related to the formal study of psychology.
I also learned a lot about life under the Nazis from Victor Klemperer’s diaries I Will Bear Witness. His life was extremely unusual. Through a combination of circumstances and luck he was Jewish in Dresden Germany and he was not sent to the camps. This actual diary is somewhat slow paced at first but he recorded what he knew and experienced from 1933 to 1945.
Did you just write a pretty good synopsis of the first chapter of man’s search for meaning as a way of demonstrating how you don’t get it?
The first half are the wild human experiences during his time at Auschwitz, where he observed the human condition in hell.
The second half of the book concerns his psychological framework “Logotherapy”, which he was working on prior to WWII.
The distinction in what he’s doing in the sections may help?
I can’t understand what it is you can’t understand.
Man’s Search for Meaning is a wonderful book that gets better as you go. Although the book uses the Holocaust as a way to provide evidence of Dr. Frankl’s thesis, it’s really about the importance of meaning for human beings, and how we can find meaning even in the worst of experiences.
Alright so like the other comments have said, you’re understanding the book about as well as anyone.
I guess what us commenters don’t know is why you picked it up in the first place. Did you want to learn about the holocaust? Or did you pick it up because you want to understand a little bit more about the psychology of humans in extreme circumstances and personal philosophies we can use to overcome those circumstances?
If it’s the former, you’ve picked up the wrong book. It’s not ~really~ “about” the the holocaust, it’s about the state of one’s mind while suffering.
This post actually served as a good reminder for me; I got some stuff going on and maybe it’s time I give Frankl a re-read.
This is my favourite book. If you keep going:
“The salvation of man is through love and in love”.
The “moslems” were people who were sick.He was also desensitised by the soup scene.
I read this book a few years ago, and I also felt like I didn’t “get” it. The second half of the book is a sort of psychological manifesto based on the experiences he described in the first half. If I had to summarize my takeaway, it would be “You have to make your own meaning in life, and people can and have found meaningful existence even in the bleakest circumstances.”, but it feels like I’m missing a big part of it.
Team: OP is searching for meaning.
I read it in the mid 90s so I don’t really remember all that well. But I do remember thinking it was a really powerful book. It also changed my outlook on inconveniences that I thought were a big deal… welll life could be way worse.
If you think that chapter is confusing just wait until you find out about all the horrible shit Frankl did