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Man's Search For Meaning: The classic tribute to hope from the Holocaust Paperback – 6 May 2004
Viktor E Frankl (Author) See search results for this author |
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16 MILLION COPIES SOLD
'A book to read, to cherish, to debate, and one that will ultimately keep the memories of the victims alive' John Boyne, author of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
A prominent Viennese psychiatrist before the war, Viktor Frankl was uniquely able to observe the way that both he and others in Auschwitz coped (or didn't) with the experience. He noticed that it was the men who comforted others and who gave away their last piece of bread who survived the longest - and who offered proof that everything can be taken away from us except the ability to choose our attitude in any given set of circumstances. The sort of person the concentration camp prisoner became was the result of an inner decision and not of camp influences alone. Frankl came to believe man's deepest desire is to search for meaning and purpose. This outstanding work offers us all a way to transcend suffering and find significance in the art of living.
- Print length160 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherRider
- Publication date6 May 2004
- Dimensions12.6 x 0.9 x 19.8 cm
- ISBN-101844132390
- ISBN-13978-1844132393
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From the Publisher

A prominent Viennese psychiatrist before the war, Viktor Frankl was uniquely able to observe the way that both he and others in Auschwitz coped (or didn't) with the experience. He noticed that it was the men who comforted others and who gave away their last piece of bread who survived the longest - and who offered proof that everything can be taken away from us except the ability to choose our attitude in any given set of circumstances.
The sort of person the concentration camp prisoner became was the result of an inner decision and not of camp influences alone. Frankl came to believe man's deepest desire is to search for meaning and purpose. This outstanding work offers us all a way to transcend suffering and find significance in the art of living.
Product description
Review
An enduring work of survival literature. ― New York Times
A book to read, to cherish, to debate, and one that will ultimately keep the memories of the victims alive -- John Boyne, author of The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas
I have loved this book for so many years, and I think every human being should read it. -- Simon Sinek
Viktor Frankl...one of the moral heroes of the 20th century. His insights into human freedom, dignity and the search for meaning are deeply humanizing, and have the power to transform lives. His works are essential reading for those who seek to understand the human condition. Published On: 2003-10-01
About the Author
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
This book has now lived to see nearly one hundred printings in English - in addition to having been published in twenty-one other languages. And the English editions alone have sold more than three million copies.
These are the dry facts, and they may well be the reason why reports of American newspapers and particularly of American TV stations more often than not start their interviews, after listing these facts, by exclaiming: 'Dr Frankl, your book has become a true bestseller - how do you feel about such a success?' Whereupon I react by reporting that in the first place I do not at all see in the bestseller status of my book an achievement and accomplishment on my part but rather an expression of the misery of our time: if hundreds of thousands of people reach out for a book whose very title promises to deal with the question of a meaning to life, it must be a question that burns under their fingernails.
To be sure, something else may have contributed to the impact of the book: its second, theoretical part ('Logotherapy in a Nutshell') boils down, as it were, to the lesson one may distill from the first part, the autobiographical account ('Experiences in a Concentration Camp'), whereas Part One serves as the existential validation of my theories. Thus, both parts mutually support their credibility.
I had none of this in mind when I wrote the book in 1945. And I did so within nine successive days and with the firm determination that the book should be published anonymously. In fact, the first printing of the original German version does not show my name on the cover, though at the last moment, just before the book's initial publication, I did finally give in to my friends who had urged me to let it be published with my name at least on the title page. At first, however, it had been written with the absolute conviction that, as an anonymous opus, it could never earn its author literary fame. I had wanted simply to convey to the reader by way of a concrete example that life holds a potential meaning under any conditions, even the most miserable ones. And I thought that if the point were demonstrated in a situation as extreme as that in a concentration camp, my book might gain a hearing. I therefore felt responsible for writing down what I had gone through, for I thought it might be helpful to people who are prone to despair.
And so it is both strange and remarkable to me that - among some dozens of books I have authored - precisely this one, which I had intended to be published anonymously so that it could never build up any reputation on the part of the author, did become a success - the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side-effect of one's dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-produce of one's surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it. I want you to listen to what your conscience commands you to do and go on to carry it out to the best of your knowledge. Then you will live to see that in the long run - in the long run, I say! - success will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think of it.'
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Product details
- Publisher : Rider; 1st edition (6 May 2004)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 160 pages
- ISBN-10 : 1844132390
- ISBN-13 : 978-1844132393
- Dimensions : 12.6 x 0.9 x 19.8 cm
- Best Sellers Rank: 342 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- Customer reviews:
About the author

Viktor E. Frankl was professor of neurology and psychiatry at the University of Vienna Medical School until his death in 1997. He was the founder of what has come to be called the Third Viennese School of Psychotherapy (after Freud's psychoanalysis and Adler's individual psychology)—the school of logotherapy.
Born in 1905, Dr. Frankl received the degrees of Doctor of Medicine and Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Vienna. During World War II he spent three years at Auschwitz, Dachau and other concentration camps.
Dr. Frankl first published in 1924 in the International Journal of Psychoanalysis and has since published twenty-six books, which have been translated into nineteen languages, including Japanese and Chinese. He was a visiting professor at Harvard, Duquesne, and Southern Methodist Universities. Honorary Degrees have been conferred upon him by Loyola University in Chicago, Edgecliff College, Rockford College, and Mount Mary College, as well as by universities in Brazil and Venezuela. He was a guest lecturer at universities throughout the world and made fifty-one lecture tours throughout the United States alone. He was President of the Austrian Medical Society of Psychotherapy.
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Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 27 July 2022
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Anyone who feels their life has no meaning or purpose, as our society has become increasingly Dickensian in the last 10 years, will find hope, as I did, to motivate myself to lead a fuller life, in spite of some of life's setbacks. I feel a winner, now, and am grateful for a special mentor who gave me her copy to learn wisdom.... I bought my own copy, as above to refer to it in times of stress. Other than that, it is a great read, which casts an objective eye on a period of history, some would rather forget.
But actually it’s a detached prose (insofar as a scientist who lives his unchosen experiment can write) which signifies the importance of finding meaning in life.
It’s like a really visual, visceral reminder that we can survive anything if we choose to. If we have our attitude reframed or we do it ourselves. If we see purpose or meaning in suffering, we cannot die.
Quite a profound read that gave rise to new thinkings and questionings in my head, and which I intend to follow for my own personal development and flourishing but also as a path to teach others.
Thank you, for going through it, sharing it, understanding it.
His experience reminds you that human beings are capable of both the worst of imaginable crimes and the greatest displays of dignity. I'll revisit it a few times again over the course of my life, but sometimes skipping the last parts.
It’s not just a matter of enduring or retreating into an inner realm in which you’re free. In fact, it’s not really about the inner realm at all, because the way you find meaning is not within, but through a purpose in the world, something that’s outside you, something that is greater than you. It could be by creating something, and it could be — and very often is — connections to other human beings, whether it’s comrades, friends, family or the people you come up against in life. And if all else fails — as it tended to in the concentration camps — and all the usual sources of meaning fall apart, there is always the chance of finding a meaning in the suffering itself. This is something that’s very hard to talk about in the abstract, but that was the conclusion that he came to.
It’s interesting how optimistic Viktor Frankl’s philosophy is. Existentialism is often characterised as a rather morbid philosophy, dwelling on. That view of existentialism as “Life is terrible and we just have to resign ourselves to it” is a real misrepresentation. Sartre would have said, “No, we can change the circumstances of our lives.” He believed we could do it through revolution, through Marxism, through politics — and potentially through ethics as well, though that is something he never finished working out completely. With Viktor Frankl there’s a sense that we need this philosophy to help us to live. Existentialist philosophy doesn’t bring despair and angst into our lives, it gives us a way of making sense, it’s a way of discovering our own inner freedom. There’s a lot more that’s positive in existentialism than it’s ever given credit for, because it really is about how you live your life, and how you exist, given what you’re presented with. angst and anguish and the difficulty of making choices. It’s a nice foil to that caricature of existentialism. It avoids the pitfalls of Colin Wilson's evangelical approach.
It won't take you long to read - it's quite thin. Just go do it.