Viktor E. Frankl's Logotherapy, As It Relates To Concentration Camps During the same period that psychiatrist Viktor E. Frankl was devising his psychological theory know as logotherapy, he also happened to have been forced into a Nazi concentration camp. Viktor E. Frankl applied logotherapy as a means of surviving the mental horrors of concentration camps.
Frankl's journey from his home to the concentration camp was a long tedious process, which put many of the prisoners into a state of shock. The prisoners were herded onto a train, in which the cars had barely enough room to fit them all, the prisoners had to lie on their luggage for several days and nights. Frankl was not sure of what was coming exactly, for he thought that he was being shipped to some munitions factory to work as forced labor. Upon arriving at the camp, Frankl along with the other prisoners were forced to strip, had all body hair removed, and put into a shower.
English: Elie Wiesel Français : Elie Wiesel
Jewish slave laborers in the Buchenwald concentrat...
Elie Wiesel writer and spokesman on Holocaust issu...After all personal items were taken from the prisoners; they were redressed and directed toward their bunks. The bunks were wooden planks stacked together, however there were not enough bunks for each prisoner. Frankl, along with the other prisoners were forced to sleep nine men to a bed. At this point, Frankl was happy to have a chance to lie down. The following day, the prisoners were assigned to work detail.
The SS men, or soldiers who worked in the camps were severely brutal. "Beatings occurred on the slightest provocation, sometimes for no reason at all. For example, bread was rationed out at our work site and we had to line up for it. Once, the man behind me stood off a little to one side and that lack of symmetry displeased the SS guard."�...