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 PyjamasA 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 … 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.
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This is one of the best and most helpful books I have ever read. I first came across it in graduate school and have continued to re-read it every few years. Dr. Frankl was a concentration camp survivor and psychiatrist who developed a therapy based on helping people uncover the meaning in their lives. Brilliant man, inspirational book. Highly recommended.
This book could change your life!
This is the account of a psychiatrist who was incarcerated in concentration camps in the 1940’s. He gives an account of the physical trials, the mental trials and the spiritual trials of a circumstance most of us can not imagine. His account leaves one with hope and not despair.
This is a book that needs to be read and then re-read every five years or so.
I knew little of Viktor E Frankl until recently. The book came as a recommendation from a relative who received the book as a gift, during a very difficult time in his life. I then read a news article on Viktor Frankl and read that as a Jewish psychiatrist in Vienna, he established suicide-prevention centers for teenagers, trying to help them find their unique meaning in life. It’s hard to argue with a book that has 12 million copies in print. It’s a quick read, and is genuine, not preachy, and introspective. He writes of his time and observations in Auschwitz, where he saw the worst of life, and still some who chose to live. ” . . . 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.”