Source: Man's Search for Meaning
Quotes from book
Man's Search for Meaning
Viktor E. Frankl
Original title
…trotzdem Ja zum Leben sagen: Ein Psychologe erlebt das Konzentrationslager
(German, 1946)
Man's Search for Meaning is a 1946 book by Viktor Frankl chronicling his experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during World War II, and describing his psychotherapeutic method, which involved identifying a purpose in life to feel positive about, and then immersively imagining that outcome. According to Frankl, the way a prisoner imagined the future affected his longevity. The book intends to answer the question "How was everyday life in a concentration camp reflected in the mind of the average prisoner?" Part One constitutes Frankl's analysis of his experiences in the concentration camps, while Part Two introduces his ideas of meaning and his theory called logotherapy.
“The salvation of man is through love and in love.”
Source: Man's Search for Meaning (1946; 1959; 1984)
Context: A thought transfixed me: for the first time in my life I saw the truth as it is set into song by so many poets, proclaimed as the final wisdom by so many thinkers. The truth — that love is the ultimate and the highest goal to which man can aspire. Then I grasped the meaning of the greatest secret that human poetry and human thought and belief have to impart: The salvation of man is through love and in love. … For the first time in my life I was able to understand the meaning of the words, "The angels are lost in perpetual contemplation of an infinite glory."
“It is not freedom from conditions, but it is freedom to take a stand toward the conditions.”
Source: Man's Search for Meaning
“To suffer unecessarily is masochistic rather than heroic.”
Variant: To Suffer unnecessarily is masochistic rather than heroic.
Source: Man's Search for Meaning
Source: Man's Search for Meaning (1946; 1959; 1984), p. 67 in the 1959 Beacon Press edition
Source: Man's Search for Meaning
Source: Man's Search for Meaning (1946; 1959; 1984), p. 126 in the 1984 Pocket Books edition
“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”
Source: Man's Search for Meaning
“It is a peculiarity of man that he can only live by looking to the future.”
Source: Man's Search for Meaning
Source: Man's Search for Meaning
“Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of.
And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.”
Postscript 1984 : The Case for a Tragic Optimism, based on a lecture at the Third World Congress of Logotherapy, Regensburg University (19 June 1983)
Variant: So, let us be alert in a twofold sense: Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of. And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.
Source: Man's Search for Meaning (1946; 1959; 1984)
Context: You may of course ask whether we really need to refer to "saints." Wouldn't it suffice just to refer to decent people? It is true that they form a minority. More than that, they always will remain a minority. And yet I see therein the very challenge to join the minority. For the world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his best.
So, let us be alert — alert in a twofold sense:
Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of.
And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.
“You may of course ask whether we really need to refer to "saints."”
Postscript 1984 : The Case for a Tragic Optimism, based on a lecture at the Third World Congress of Logotherapy, Regensburg University (19 June 1983)
Man's Search for Meaning (1946; 1959; 1984)
Context: You may of course ask whether we really need to refer to "saints." Wouldn't it suffice just to refer to decent people? It is true that they form a minority. More than that, they always will remain a minority. And yet I see therein the very challenge to join the minority. For the world is in a bad state, but everything will become still worse unless each of us does his best.
So, let us be alert — alert in a twofold sense:
Since Auschwitz we know what man is capable of.
And since Hiroshima we know what is at stake.
