Full access

Images in Psychiatry

Published Online: 1 April 2000

Viktor Emil Frankl 1905–1997

MAT GELMAN, M.B., B.S., LIESL KOSMA, B.A., DIP.ED., CHRISTOPHER S.E. WURM, M.B., B.S., F.R.A.C.G.P., and NICHOLAS KEKS, M.B., B.S., PH.D., F.R.A.N.Z.C.P.Authors Info & Affiliations

Publication: American Journal of Psychiatry

Volume 157, Number 4

https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.157.4.625

PDF/EPUB

Professor Frankl founded the “third Viennese school of psychotherapy,” calling it “logotherapy.” The Greek logos denotes meaning. Logotherapy departed from the psychotherapies of Frankl’s early mentors Freud and Adler. It focuses on the potential for self-transcendent meaningful choices, especially in response to adversity.

Frankl was a proud descendent of the medieval rabbinical leader the Maharal of Prague. As a psychiatrist, Frankl developed logotherapy before the Anschluss. In Nazi Vienna he protected his psychotic patients from “mercy killing”: some patients could be hidden, for others schizophrenia was reclassified as dysphasia, and dementia became depression.

After his deportation to concentration camps, Frankl and others attended to those most psychologically vulnerable. As a keynote of the theme of therapy then offered, Frankl quoted Nietzsche’s dictum: Whoever has a why to live for can cope with almost any how.

Frankl, however, lost his first wife, parents, and brother in the camps. After the war he returned to Vienna, remaining in public psychiatry. Taking Freud’s professorial chair, he lectured and wrote widely. His honors included APA’s Oskar Pfister Award. Frankl’s most popular book is Man’s Search for Meaning (1).

Logotherapy is existentially based, hinging on the availability of responsivity in personally unique self-transcendent and creative modalities inherent in the human condition. Special value is placed on attitudinal responses to the “tragic triad” of suffering, guilt, and death. Hence a famous dictum of Frankl: Everything can be taken from man except one thing, the last of the human freedoms, to choose one’s attitude in any given situation, even if only for a few moments.

He added a new interpretation to DSM: Despair equals Suffering minus Meaning. In the face of unavoidable suffering, the patient’s freely chosen unique self-transcendent response may be found to be powerfully redeeming.

Frankl promoted logotherapy as a supplementary approach and not as a panacea. It remains a neglected but most worthy legacy.

Footnote

Dr. Gelman, Dandenong Area Mental Health Service, David St., Dandenong, Victoria 3175, Australia. Photograph courtesy of Dr. Eleonore Frankl (Frankl’s widow); Ms. Kosma is Frankl’s niece.

References

Frankl VE: Man’s Search for Meaning: An Introduction to Logotherapy. Boston, Beacon Press, 1992

Google Scholar

Information & Authors

Information

Published In

American Journal of Psychiatry

Volume 157 • Number 4 • April 2000

Pages: 625

History

Published online: 1 April 2000

Published in print: April 2000

Authors

Affiliations

MAT GELMAN, M.B., B.S.

View all articles by this author

LIESL KOSMA, B.A., DIP.ED.

View all articles by this author

CHRISTOPHER S.E. WURM, M.B., B.S., F.R.A.C.G.P.

View all articles by this author

NICHOLAS KEKS, M.B., B.S., PH.D., F.R.A.N.Z.C.P.

View all articles by this author

Metrics & Citations

Metrics

Citations

Export Citations

If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.

For more information or tips please see 'Downloading to a citation manager' in the Help menu.

Format	RIS (ProCite, Reference Manager) EndNote BibTex Medlars RefWorks
Direct importt
Citation style
Style

Copy to clipboard
Tips for downloading citations

There are no citations for this item

View Options

View options

PDF/ePub

View PDF/ePub

Get Access

Login options

Already a subscriber? Access your subscription through your login credentials or your institution for full access to this article.

Personal login Institutional Login Open Athens login

Purchase Options

Purchase this article to access the full text.

PPV Articles - American Journal of Psychiatry

Not a subscriber?

Subscribe Now / Learn More

PsychiatryOnline subscription options offer access to the DSM-5-TR^® library, books, journals, CME, and patient resources. This all-in-one virtual library provides psychiatrists and mental health professionals with key resources for diagnosis, treatment, research, and professional development.

Need more help? PsychiatryOnline Customer Service may be reached by emailing [email protected] or by calling 800-368-5777 (in the U.S.) or 703-907-7322 (outside the U.S.).

Viktor Emil Frankl 1905–1997

Footnote

References