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Man's Searching for Meaning - Victor Frankel

This book is other wonderful reading on the topic of Nazism and concentration camps. I know this book listening it from my father and I always had curiosity in reading it. In the past two weeks I finally bought it, and read it in English in only one week. My English skills are not as good as I would like to be and I definitely will read it a couple of more times to completely understand all the book. I recommend this book for those who want to read other sources about the suffering in concentration camps, the life of opressors and opressed people and the meaning of life. __Victor Frankel__ was a psychotherapist, and was sent as a priosioner to two different concentration camps.

The book is divided in two parts. The first one, Frankel describes his and other prisioners lives in concentration camps. And in the second part, Frankel tells us about his theory, called logotherapy, in which he supports with the concentration camps' experiences.

We certainly quetioned ourselves: "Why did all the priosioners who survived didn't commit suicide while in the concentration camps?", "What were the thoughts and emotional difficults that these priosioners had?". Victor Frankel, as a psychotherapist, uses his book to even more than telling us about the horrors in concentration camps, but to also tell about the psychology aspects of prisioners' lives.

The book is based in one big idea quoted by **Frederick Nietzsche:** **'He who has a //why// for life can put with any** //**how.'**// It demonstrates how the priosioners suvived with all the horrors at the camps, just by having a meaning in their lives, and making their onw suffers a tool to be stronger.

Frankel's reason to write is described in the book: //"I had wanted simply to convey to the reader by way of 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."//

He describes how can be different the attitudes of people in concentration camps. There are those who give up of their lives, those who even help others, those who act in bad manners thinking that they have enough excuses for being suffering, those nazis who were in the end good people: "It is apparent that the mere knowledge that a man was either a camp guard or a prisoner tells us almost nothing. Human kindness can be found in all groups, even those which as a whole it would be easy to condemn. The boundaries between groups overlapped and we must not try to simplify matters by saying that these men were angels and those were devils. Certainly, it was a considerable achievement for a guard or foreman to be kind to the prisoners in spite of all the camp’s influences, and, on the other hand, the baseness of a prisoner who treated his own companions badly was exceptionally contemptible. Obviously the prisoners found the lack of character in such men especially upsetting, while they were profoundly moved by the smallest kindness received from any of the guards." "We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that **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**."

In the end, after staying so many years in concentration camps, being free again has its difficulties:
 * "A man who for years had thought he had reached the absolute limit of all possible suffering now found that suffering had no limits, and that he could suffer still more, and more intensely."
 * "Woe to him, when the day of his dreams finally came, found it to be so different from all that he had longed for!"
 * "We were not hoping for happiness---And yet we were not prepared for unhappiness."

a)  * Sadness and depression using the term night in poetry:    Night is the worst time    Night is a hard time    Why can't I sleep    Why can't I rest    Pain in my heart    Pain in my eyes    Lost is my true love    Lost is my heart    The night is dark    Dark are my thoughts    Lost is the daylight    Lost is my life    Night is like death    Night is so cold    Hurt when I rest    Hurt in my soul    Longing for you    Longing to hold you    Lost forever    Lost to the night    * Author that uses night in his books: Stephen King (thrillers and mystery books)    * A lot of music uses the term night to also represent love and romance. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAEQzVv_Itc http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAEQzVv_Itc
 * 1)  Night and Darkness
 * http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTf46z2H34o#
 * Dissapointment and ilusions in relationships:

=Faith= __Quotes from the book Night:__


 * 'In the beginning there was faith - which is childish; trust - which is vain; and iluusion - which is dangerous.'
 * 'We believed in God, trusted in man..'
 * 'Have we ever considered the consequence of a less visible, less striking abomination, yet the worst of all, for those of us who have faith: the death of God in the soul of a child who suddenly faces absolute evil?'
 * 'I've got more faith in Hitler than in anyone else. He's the only one who's kept his promises, all his promises, to the Jewish people.'