Editing Man's Search for Meaning (section)

==Reception==
In a 1991 survey conducted for the [[Library of Congress]] and the [[Book of the Month Club]], ''Man's Search for Meaning'' was named one of the 10 most influential books in the US.<ref>{{Cite news|last1=Fein|first1=Esther B.|date=20 November 1991|title=New York Times, 11-20-1991|newspaper=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/11/20/books/book-notes-059091.html|access-date=21 April 2020|archive-date=28 April 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200428021311/https://www.nytimes.com/1991/11/20/books/book-notes-059091.html|url-status=live}}</ref> At the time of Frankl's death in 1997, the book had sold over 10 million copies and had been translated into 24 languages. As of 2022 the book has sold 16 million copies and been printed in 52 languages.<ref>{{cite news |title=How Instagram turned a Holocaust memoir into a self-help manifesto |url=https://www.vox.com/the-goods/23467058/mans-search-for-meaning-frankl-holocaust-memoir-wellness-instagram |agency=Vox}}</ref>

[[Gordon Allport]], who wrote a preface to the book, described it as a "gem of dramatic narrative" which "provides a compelling introduction to the most significant psychological movement of our day".<ref>''Man's Search for Meaning'', Viktor Frankl</ref> [[Sarah Bakewell]] describes it as "an incredibly powerful and moving example of what [[existentialist]] thought can actually be for in real life"<ref>{{cite web |title=The best books on Existentialism |url=https://fivebooks.com/best-books/existentialism-sarah-bakewell/#book-6795}}</ref> while [[Mary Fulbrook]] praises "the way [Frankl] explores the importance of meaning in life as the key to survival."<ref>{{cite web |title=The best books on Auschwitz |url=https://fivebooks.com/best-books/auschwitz-mary-fulbrook/}}</ref>

However, aspects of the book have garnered criticism.  One of Frankl's main ideas in the book is that a [[Positive mental attitude|positive attitude]] made one better equipped for surviving the camps. Richard Middleton-Kaplan has said that this implies, whether intentionally or unintentionally, that those who died had given up and that this paved the way for the idea of the Jews going [[like sheep to the slaughter]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Middleton-Kaplan |first1=Richard |editor1-last=Henry |editor1-first=Patrick |title=Jewish Resistance Against the Nazis |date=2014 |publisher=[[Catholic University of America Press]] |location=Washington, D.C. |isbn=978-0813225890 |pages=9–10 |language=en |chapter=The Myth of Jewish Passivity}}</ref> Holocaust analyst [[Lawrence L. Langer]] criticises Frankl's promotion of logotherapy and says the book has a  problematic subtext. He also accuses Frankl of having a tone of self-aggrandizement and a general inhumane sense of studying-detachment towards victims of the Holocaust.<ref>Lawrence Langer, ''Versions of Survival: The Holocaust and the Human Spirit'' (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1982), p. 24.</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/43137|title=Redeeming the Unredeemable: Auschwitz and Man's Search for Meaning|first=Timothy|last=Pytell|date=June 3, 2003|journal=Holocaust and Genocide Studies|volume=17|issue=1|pages=89–113|doi=10.1093/hgs/17.1.89|via=Project MUSE|url-access=subscription}}</ref>

In his book ''Faith in Freedom'', psychiatrist [[Thomas Szasz]] states that Frankl's survivor testimony was written to misdirect, and betrays instead an intent of a transparent effort to conceal Frankl's actions and his collaboration with the Nazis, and that, in the assessment of [[Raul Hilberg]], the founder of [[Holocaust studies|Holocaust Studies]], Frankl's historical account contains distortions akin to [[Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood|Binjamin Wilkomirski]]'s memoirs, which were translated into nine languages before being exposed as deeply problematic (and according to the most radical interpretation 'false') in Hilberg's 1996 ''Politics of Memory''.<ref>''Faith in Freedom'', p. 181 Thomas Szasz</ref>  Szasz's criticism of Frankl is not universally embraced.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Thomas Szasz: An Evaluation {{!}} Psychology Today |url=https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/mood-swings/201801/thomas-szasz-evaluation |access-date=2024-03-18 |website=www.psychologytoday.com |language=en-US}}</ref>{{irrelevant citation|date=December 2024|reason=Off topic citation because the cited source is an interesting and nuanced analysis of Szasz's contribution to Psychiatry and mental health; but it does not mention Szasz's criticism of Frankl's holocaust account in Man's Search For Meaning}}  Similarly, Hilberg's allegations have been rebutted by several reviewers.<ref>{{Cite journal |title=Review of the Wilkomirski Affair |url=https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1336&context=sahs_review |journal=Swiss American Historical Society Review |volume=37 |issue=3 |pages=25–32}}</ref> Comparison between Frankl's memoirs and Wilkomirski's memoirs leveled by Szasz, however, could legitimately be dismissed altogether as an inapt and misleading analogy insofar as questions arose (and remained) as to whether or not Wilkomirski had ever been an inmate at a concentration camp, whereas this was never a question in Frankl's case: there is no doubt that he is a survivor.

Briefly: Conflicting views about the nature of memory under extreme conditions, as well as the sort of instinctual opportunism (for the sake of survival) or [[Positive psychology|positive thinking mentality]] that often (one might even say 'usually' or 'almost always') correlated with long-term survival in the Nazi death camps, makes the memoir an important document of witness during the holocaust but also highlight the way in which it displays the cognitive and psychological limits of representing a situation like the Nazi extermination from an 'impartial' first person perspective.

Based on a suggestion in Man's Search for Meaning, a proposed [[Statue of Responsibility]] has been designed by Utah sculptor [[Gary Lee Price]] and endorsed for construction by the Utah governor. In the book, Frankl makes the following statement about the sculpture:<blockquote>Freedom, however, is not the last word. Freedom is only part of the story and half of the truth. Freedom is but the negative aspect of the whole phenomenon whose positive aspect is responsibleness. In fact, freedom is in danger of degenerating into mere arbitrariness unless it is lived in terms of responsibleness. That is why I recommend that the Statue of Liberty on the East Coast be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Frankl |first=Viktor |title=Man's Search for Meaning |publisher=Beacon Press |year=2006 |isbn=978-0807014264}}</ref></blockquote>