I've been reading through Viktor Frankl's book Man's Search for Meaning about his concentration camp experiences and psychological theory of meaning-making. My reading and interest in his book has primarily though an existential lens and for personal reasons, and to this end it seems like a good book, but I've recently found criticisms about him and his book. I would like a historian's perspective.
Wikipedia has goes into it on his book page and the author's page. In short, some argue his works come off as victim blaming. The idea that people can rise to the occasion and create meaning in even the horrific conditions might inspire, but his apparent insistence that everyone can do so might denigrate those who didn't.
I'm tempted to recommend the book, but I don't want to do so if people are likely to takeaway the wrong idea or if it's historically contentious.
I just realized that I am kinda overwhelmed with a lot of other work irl right now but I still wanted to give you at least a place to start. I can't really assess Frankl's theories overall since they lie somewhat outside my expertise as a historian. Similarly, some of these wiki pages mention criticism but don't really link to it.
The gist of it is that several survivors of the camps have observed the phenomenon that very religious or highly politicized prisoners had – overall – a different way of dealing with imprisonment in the camps. Not necessarily because of their capacity to generate meaning but because of their integration into certain communities that share a certain "meaning" (see also Jehovah's Witnesses as a an example). In this sense, victim blaming I don't think is a good term for what Frankl writes since it is based on observations that others have shared.
If you are interested further in this matter, one of the most interesting contributions is the Jean Amery - Primo Levi debate about the intellectual in Auschwitz that took place after Amery killed himself but is interesting nonetheless. You can read more about it in the preface to the 1990 dissent edition of At the Mind’s Limits by Amery or f.ex. in this article