Viktor E. Frankl “Man’s Search for Meaning.” Psychological Effects of Camp Life
Viktor E. Frankl was a well-known author –psychiatrist of a very difficult destiny. He experienced several years as a prisoner in a concentration camp of Auschwitz and wrote a very impressive autobiographical book “Man’s Search for Meaning” that concerns many aspects of a human being perception of reality in difficult and nearly impossible conditions of living.
There were some ways for prisoners how to survive. The first one was to become a Capo, a kind of a helper for SS men. In order to be safe, some people were ready for lose all good personal qualities and use brutality, theft, and betrayal of their friends. (Frankl 19)
As for prisoners who preserved their human qualities even in desperate and dangerous conditions of camp-living they had to walk through some psychological conditions that in some situations helped them to survive.
The condition of “delusion of reprieve” when a person sentenced to death had a weak hope to be reprieved. When the author with his mates arrived at the camp, they were met by a group of people who seemed to be healthy and well-fed. This fact forced them to think that things were not as bad as they thought. (Frankl 23)
The prisoners’ desire to live was so strong that even when they were naked and shaved they understood that they could lose only one thing, their “naked life.” It is difficult to imagine the prisoners’ feelings at that moment. Then they came into a condition of curiosity, “What will happen next?” This interest was strange and terrifying but it confirmed the desire to survive in any situations. (Frankl 29)
The work of brain in dangerous circumstances helped prisoners to survive too. They had to sleep in incredibly uncomfortable tiers. In normal life, they could hardly fell asleep in uncomfortable beds surrounding with the snoring neighbors but they did. The author cites the words of Dostoevsky that the best describes this way of surviving “Yes, the man can get used to anything, but do not ask us how.” (Frankl 30) Thus, it was the first psychological stage of prisoners, the stage of shock when they did not fear death when such processes as hope, curiosity and brain protection helped them to survive.
The second stage was the stage of apathy that was a kind of emotional death. It was a period of prisoners’ adaptation to the terrible work conditions and lack of food. (Frankl 32) Apathy could be a kind of protection from a dreadful reality. ViKtor E. Frankl described the event in a hut for typhus when the body of a dead of typhus was removed from the room without any respect to that departure person and the author watched that process with the total indifference, although he talked to that man some time ago. This event showed us that that lack of emotions helped prisoners to survive too.
The third stage was the stage after liberation. A reader could expect that the prisoners would feel joy and happiness after their release but was disappointed. The prisoners were not happy. (Frankl 95) They were so tired of sufferings and got used to them that they hardly understood what had happened. This state called “depersonalization” and could be considered as the protective reaction of mind.
What got most in the way of psychological well-being?
It is impossible to say that the prisoners in Auschwitz had a psychological well-being. Nevertheless, they did their best to comfort themselves in different ways in order to remain people. Such features as sympathy to their mates and spirit of fellowship helped the prisoners to survive. The most important part in maintaining the psychological well-being among the prisoners played the author. He was a professional and his actions sometimes were not the actions of a kind-hearted person but the actions of a psychotherapist who talked to his patients. His attempts to create a psychological well-being for the camp prisoners aimed at giving them the inner strength to continue to live. (Frankl 81) He talked to his mates who were weak and could not move because of exhaustion that life is worth to live. He tried to inspire their tortured souls that such things as health, family, work and money could be restored in future. The most important is the fact that they manage to survive and preserve not only their bodies but the souls safe. He cited Nietzsche “That which does not kill me, makes me stronger.” (Frankl 89)
Thus, due to the psychological well-being, most of the prisoners got the strength to overcome the pain and depression. They survived in the terrible conditions of the concentration camp, and became strong enough to live and hope for better in the future.
Are there worse things than death?
There was one event that, in my opinion completely discovered Viktor E. Frankl’s attitude towards this issue. When the author and some of his fellows were sent to a so-called “rest camp” and had a couple of days off for their exhausted bodies the chef doctor came to the sick quarter and asked the author to help him with the people who suffered from typhus. Victor understood that that work could kill him because of his weakness and possibility to get ill. Nevertheless, he decided to volunteer because in that situation he found the meaning of his death. For him, the life without purpose but with the only one aim to survive was like the existence of a vegetable. The author thought that his useless labor for SS men was not the reason of his life and his help to the ill comrades, worth to die as a human. (Frankl 59-60)
Thus, it can be concluded that a useless life is a thing that can be worth than death.
Works Cited
Frankl, Viktor E. Man's Search for Meaning. An Introduction to Logotherapy. 4th ed.
Boston, Massachusetts: Beacon Press, 1992. Print.
