Man´s Search for Meaning (2)

The illusion of pardon  

It´s a feeling of consolation that those condemned to death develop before their execution. Wretched who conceive the hope that they will be pardoned at the last moment.

Upon arrival at the Lager, Viktor E Frankl 'plays' the finger game. An SS officer points his finger to the left or to the right: to the left, they sent those who couldn´t work, to the right it involved forced labour. This game ended with a score of 9 to 1; that´s to say, the weak and sick were sent to the crematorium within a few hours. One in ten newcomers had the opportunity to see a new day born.

On page 47, prisoner nº 119104 confesses that when his manuscript — his life's work — was stripped from him, he understood that his previous life had been completely annulled. At that very moment, he was beginning to be another man. In the middle of the 'shock' phase, it was also normal for the Auschwitz inmate — at least in the first phase of shock — to lose the fear of death.

Instead of describing here what our protagonist felt in this first phase (being only a naked body), I encourage you, dear reader, to get the book and be the one to discover the psychological reactions that the inmate experiences these first weeks in the Lager.

From my Borstal.

LDR

 

Viktor Frankl.- El hombre en busca de sentido. CTE. Herder Editorial. Barcelona, 2015