Viktor E. Frankl (1905–1997) was an Austrian neurologist and psychiatrist and a survivor of the Holocaust. He became one of the great psychotherapists of the twentieth century. He published more than forty books, lectured and taught seminars all over the world, and received numerous awards and honorary degrees. His interest in psychology began as a teenager. He earned a degree as a medical doctor and served at a psychiatric hospital. In 1942, he and his family were sent to Nazi concentration camps, where his wife, father, mother, and brother perished. After his release, he became a professor of neurology and psychiatry at the University of Vienna Medical School and was head of the neurological department of the Vienna Polyclinic Hospital for twenty-five years. He wrote works on philosophy, psychotherapy, and neurology, including the international bestseller Man's Search for Meaning, based on his experiences as a concentration camp prisoner. He was the founder of the school of logotherapy, which came to be called the third Viennese School of Psychotherapy, after Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis and Alfred Adler's individual psychology. |
