Meaning Page 3
COLLEAGUE: Only you could …
FRANKL: We were all blessed the same way—our meager warmth helped in the cold. Only two blankets for nine men. Yet, sleep always came, with a peaceful oblivion and a relief from pain for a few hours.
A gas chamber.
Source: Hartmann, E. (1995). In the Camps.
COLLEAGUE: Any more medical lies?
FRANKL: There was no way to clean our teeth. Despite that and a severe vitamin deficiency, we had healthier gums than before. Imagine! We wore the same clothes for months. Also, we could rarely wash. Somehow, the sores and cuts on our hands did not suppurate. Frostbite was something else.
COLLEAGUE: You survived.
FRANKL: Don’t ask me how. Dostoyevsky defined man as a being who could get used to anything. We would reply, “Yes, a man can get used to anything, but do not ask us how.” Do not ask me how.
End of Scene 5
Scene 6
Suicide
Title Board: CONTEMPLATING SUICIDE
Running into the wire
Colleague; Frankl; Man
Visual: Wire fences around camp. Body on fence. Walking tall. Prisoner with crudely shaved face.
Stage Directions: Series of slides matching the dialogue. End with slides of a prisoner standing tall and proud.
COLLEAGUE: In a place like that I might have killed myself.
FRANKL: Some did. The thought of suicide was entertained by nearly everyone, if only for a brief time. This was born of the hopelessness, the constant danger of capricious death, seeing so many others die daily. We lived, if that is the right word, with death.
COLLEAGUE: Yet, you didn’t …
FRANKL: … commit suicide? No. From personal convictions on that first night I made myself a firm promise that I would not “run into the wire.”
COLLEAGUE: Explain, please.
FRANKL: Explain, explain. You want words. We lived it. The most popular method of suicide was running into the electrically charged fence. Fast and simple.
COLLEAGUE: Go on.
Fences.
Source: Hartmann, E. (1995). In the Camps.
FRANKL: In another way, there was little point in committing suicide. We knew that our life expectancy was very short. There were all the “selections.” Accidents and diseases, too. After the first shock, we did not fear death. Even the gas chambers lost their horrors for us after the first ten days. After all, they spared us the act of committing suicide.
COLLEAGUE: Your attitude was different.
FRANKL: Perhaps. Friends later told me that I was one whom the shock of admission did not greatly depress. Let me tell you a story.
COLLEAGUE: Yes.
FRANKL: Afriend smuggled himself into our block to enlighten us. He was so thin, we almost didn’t recognize him. He had a good humor and a devil-may-care attitude while he gave us some tips.
MAN: Don’t be afraid. Don’t fear the selections! They have a soft spot for doctors.
COLLEAGUE: Did they?
FRANKL: Not true. Not true. I can still hear him …
MAN: Shave daily if you can, even if you have to use a piece of glass. Even if you have to use your last piece of bread for it. You will look younger and the scraping will make your cheeks look ruddier. If you want to stay alive, there is only one way: look fit for work. If you even limp, because, let us say, you have a small blister on your heel, and an SS man spots this, he will wave you aside and the next day you will be gassed.
FRANKL: Thank you.
MAN: Do you know what we mean by a “Moslem”? A man who looks miserable, down and out, sick and emaciated, and who cannot manage hard physical labor any longer … That is a “Moslem.” Sooner or later, usually sooner, every “Moslem” goes to the gas chambers. Remember: shave, stand and walk smartly, then you need not be afraid of gas. All of you standing here, even if you have only been here twenty-four hours, you need not fear gas, except perhaps for you.
FRANKL: Me?
MAN: I hope you don’t mind my telling you frankly.
FRANKL: No.
MAN: You see, of all of you he is the only one who must fear the next selection. So, don’t worry!
FRANKL: [Smiling.] Thank you, you really are a good man.
End of Scene 6
Scene 7
Apathy—The Second Stage
Title Board: APATHY—THE SECOND STAGE
Survival
Colleague; Frankl; Foreman
Visual: Digging latrines. Beating prisoners. In a hut. Talking to a Capo.
Stage Directions: Match visuals to dialogue. End up with talking to a Capo.
COLLEAGUE: You talk about stages, the changes all of the inmates went through. Were these fast?
FRANKL: Well, the second stage developed quite rapidly. In just a few days we all developed a relative apathy, a kind of emotional death.
COLLEAGUE: Just too numb to react.
FRANKL: It was the hopelessness, the degradation, the constant exposure to death and deprivation and torture. It never stopped and there was no escape.
COLLEAGUE: Except running into the wire.
FRANKL: Let me give you an example. A new arrival was usually assigned to a work group to clean the latrines and remove the sewage. It frequently happened that some of the excrement splashed into his face during its transport. Any sign of disgust, an attempt to wipe it off was punished by a blow from a Capo.
COLLEAGUE: You were shit.
FRANKL: No escape. No escape from those things.
COLLEAGUE: So, you became hardened.
FRANKL: Of course. That was survival. At first we couldn’t look at prisoners being punished; maybe just walking up and down for hours in the mire. In no more than a few weeks, you did not avert your eyes from these scenes. Feelings were blunted, and you watched unmoved.
COLLEAGUE: A kind of protective dissociation.
FRANKL: We just did not see it any more. Survival. When a man died, one by one the prisoners approached the still warm body. One took what food there was. Another traded shoes or a coat. And another was glad to secure some string—just imagine—genuine string! I watched with unconcern, like everyone else. I may have spoken to that man an hour ago—now I just continued sipping my soup. I am even surprised now that I remember that.
COLLEAGUE: You also had to survive beatings.
Concentration camp uniform.
Source: Hartmann, E. (1995). In the Camps.
FRANKL: Of course. Beatings occurred on the slightest provocation, sometimes for no reason at all. Strangely, a blow for no reason can hurt more than one that is earned. Once I was mending a railroad track in a snowstorm. I worked hard since that was a way to keep warm. For only one moment I paused to get my breath and lean on my shovel. The guard turned round then, saw me, and thought I was loafing. The pain he caused me was not from any insults or any blows. He did not think it worthwhile to say anything, not even a swear word, to that ragged and emaciated figure standing before him. He threw a stone at me, like you would to get the attention of a dumb beast.
Inside a concentration camp hut.
Source: Poznanski, S. (1963). Struggle, Death, Memory. 1939–1945.
COLLEAGUE: Unbearable. Unbearable.
FRANKL: Another time we were in a forest, digging, with the temperature at two Fahrenheit. There was a foreman with chubby rosy cheeks.
FORMAN: You, pig. I have been watching you the whole time! I’ll teach you to work, yet! Wait till you dig dirt with your teeth—you’ll die like an animal! In two days, I’ll finish you off! You haven’t done a stroke of work in your life. What were you, swine? A businessman?
FRANKL: I was a doctor, a specialist.
FORMAN: What? A doctor? I bet you got a lot of money out of people.
FRANKL: No. As it happens, I did most of my work for no money at all, in clinics for the poor.
[Foreman screams and shouts and beats Frankl.]
COLLEAGUE: A crazy man.
Clandestine image of Sonderkommando forced to burn bod
ies in Birkenau.
Source: Zelizer, B. (2000). Visual Culture and The Holocaust.
FRANKL: No, that is not the point. It wasn’t about the cruelty and pain. It was the insult. I had to listen to a man judge my life who had so little idea of it. No understanding at all.
COLLEAGUE: Yet again you survived.
FRANKL: The Capo in that group saved me. This happened a number of times—I don’t know why.
COLLEAGUE: “Whys” can be dangerous.
FRANKL: One Capo had taken a liking to me because I listened to his love stories and matrimonial troubles. He poured them out during the long marches to our work site.
COLLEAGUE: Just listening can help.
FRANKL: Yes. But I also made an impression on him with my diagnosis of his character and with my psychotherapeutic advice. I was very happy to be the personally appointed physician to His Honor the Capo!
End of Scene 7
Scene 8
Dreams and Food
Title Board: DREAMS AND FOOD
Colleague; Frankl; Man
Visual: Food lines in camp. Eating in a hut. Restaurant in color. Meal at home in color. Bakery window. Supermarket.
Stage Directions: Alternate camp photos in black and white of people eating with color photos of bakery, restaurant, supermarket, festive meal at home. Fade through with a fuzzy focus from one to the other.
COLLEAGUE: In those hard times did you still dream?
FRANKL: Yes, yes. Of course. Our wishes and desires became obvious in our dreams.
COLLEAGUE: What did the prisoners dream about most frequently?
FRANKL: Oh, we dreamed about bread, cake, cigarettes—and nice warm baths. We sought wish-fulfillment in dreams. Did they do any good? After all, the dreamer had to wake from them to the reality of camp life, to those terrible constraints.
COLLEAGUE: Yet you kept dreaming.
FRANKL: Yes. I shall never forget how I was roused one night by the groans of a fellow prisoner. He was throwing himself about in his sleep, obviously having a terrible nightmare.
COLLEAGUE: What did you do?
FRANKL: I wanted to wake the poor man since I had always been especially sorry for people who suffered from fearful dreams or deliria.
COLLEAGUE: And?
FRANKL: And I suddenly drew back the hand which was ready to shake him. I was frightened at the thing I was about to do.
COLLEAGUE: Why?
FRANKL: You see, at that moment I became intensely conscious of the fact that no dream, no matter how horrible, could be as bad as the reality of the camp which surrounded us. No dream.
COLLEAGUE: I see. But your dreams about food?
FRANKL Well, the desire for food was the major primitive instinct around which mental life centered. If they were not closely watched, they would immediately start discussing food.
A concentration camp day-room table.
Source: Hartmann, E. (1995). In the Camps.
MAN: What are you favorite dishes?
FRANKL: You tell me now.
MAN: I have some wonderful recipes for you. Look, let’s plan our menu for tomorrow. We’ll start with breakfast.
FRANKL: Good, good.
MAN: Oh, oh, what a reunion we’ll have when this is all over. Tables just loaded with food. All kinds of breads, piled high in baskets. Fresh baked, crisp, full of bread smells.
FRANKL: Yes.
MAN: And other tables loaded with cheeses, soft and hard and in between. Meats, fruits, vegetables. Strawberries, endless bowls, bright red, just ripe, and bowls of cream.
FRANKL: The guard is coming.
MAN: Not now. Please God, not now.
COLLEAGUE: Those could be dangerous illusions.
FRANKL: I always regarded such talk about food as dangerous. Those images did not connect with our extremely small rations. Our bodies adapted to nonexistent calories.
COLLEAGUE: Yet you survived.
FRANKL: Some of us. Some of us. The daily ration consisted of very watery soup given out once daily, and the usual small bread ration.
COLLEAGUE: That’s all?
FRANLK: No. There was usually a so-called “extra allowance” of three-fourths of an ounce of margarine, or a slice of poor-quality sausage, or a little piece of cheese, a bit of synthetic honey, or a spoonful of watery jam. These varied daily. An absolutely inadequate number of calories.
COLLEAGUE: It was something.
FRANKL: No. You must consider our heavy manual work, our constant exposure to cold, and our inadequate clothing. Most of us had edema and our feet barely fit in our unlaced shoes.
COLLEAGUE: So shoes were a major problem.
FRANKL: One morning I heard someone, whom I knew to be brave and dignified, cry like a child because he finally had to go to the snowy marching grounds in his bare feet, as his shoes were too shrunken for him to wear.
COLLEAGUE: And you?
FRANKL: What? Oh, yes. Astrange thing. In these ghastly minutes, I found a little bit of comfort: a small piece of bread which I drew out of my pocket and munched with absorbed delight.
COLLEAGUE: A small piece of bread.
FRANKL: Our longing wasn’t for the sake of good food itself, but for the sake of knowing that the subhuman existence, which had made us unable to think of anything other than food, would at last cease.
COLLEAGUE: Having plentiful food was a symbol. You talked about two schools of thought.
FRANKL: Yes. One was in favor of eating up the ration immediately. I finally joined the ranks of the second group, dividing up the ration, even with the danger of possible theft or loss.
COLLEAGUE: In your dreams, was there no sexual urge?
FRANKL: Sexual urge? In that environment! Undernourishment did away with it. Also, in those all-male camps there was little sexual perversion.
COLLEAGUE: Strange and not strange. Yet, having to concentrate on saving your skin must have made everything else …
FRANLK: … secondary. Survival, and important dreams. Things and people to live for. To live for …
Notes from Dachau.
Source: Viktor Frankl Institute, Vienna, Austria.
End of Scene 8
Scene 9
Politics and Religion
Title Board: POLITICS AND RELIGION
Colleague; Frankl
Visual: Group debating. Group praying. But in camp clothes.
Stage Directions: Slowly dissolve from debating photo to praying one.
Buchenwald, April, 1945. Photo by Margaret Bourke-White.
Source: Zelizer, B. (2000). Visual Culture and The Holocaust.
COLLEAGUE: You must have talked about something.
FRANKL: Would you believe politics and religion?
COLLEAGUE: In a death camp?
FRANKL: The politics were based chiefly on rumors. Particularly about the military situation. It was the incorrigible optimists who were the most irritating companions.
COLLEAGUE: That was the politics?
FRANKL: Rumors. There were no papers.
COLLEAGUE: And religion?
FRANKL: Our religious interactions were the most sincere imaginable. There were improvised prayers and services in the most unlikely places: a corner of a hut, a locked cattle truck bringing us back from a distant work site, within our minds snatches of forgotten prayers.
COLLEAGUE: Those with the strongest religious beliefs survived?
FRANKL: Not always, but it always helped. It always helped.
Miecszylaw Koscielniak: “Prayers beside a dead man” (Print).
Source: Poznanski, S (1963). Struggle, Death, Memory. 1939–1945.
End of Scene 9
Scene 10
My Wife’s Image
Title Board: MY WIFE’S IMAGE
Guard; Colleague; Man; Frankl
Visual: Wedding photo. Sign at entrance of Auschwitz, “Arbeit Macht Frei.” Photo of men digging.
Stage Directions: Go through slides, matching to dialogue, and end up with photo of Tilly Frankl.
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GUARD: Keep moving you slackers. Move.
COLLEAGUE: They are moving. Can’t you see? In the dark, over large stones, through icy puddles, with sore feet, some with no shoes.
GUARD: Keep moving. I have shoes, warm clothes. No matter. But these dead people, hah! Maybe get them to dig a little. Move there, you. Can’t you walk on your own? I’ll teach you …
COLLEAGUE: What do you know of them, their inner lives, their loves, their passions?
GUARD: Numbers, that’s all they are. Numbers. Move on there.
MAN: [Whispering.] If our wives could see us now! I do hope they are better off in their camps and don’t know what is happening to us.
COLLEAGUE: What are you thinking, Frankl?
FRANKL: Of my wife. I knew that each of us was thinking of his wife. Occasionally, I looked at the sky, where the stars were fading and the pink light of the morning was beginning to spread behind a dark bank of clouds.
Tilly Frankl.
Source: Frankl, V.E. (1997). Viktor Frankl Recollections. An Autobiography.
COLLEAGUE: And?
FRANKL: And my mind clung to my wife’s image, imagining it with an uncanny acuteness. I heard her answering me, saw her smile, her frank and encouraging look. Real or not, her look was then more luminous than the sun which was beginning to rise.