Book Analysis - "Schizo" by Nic Sheff
Book Analysis - Schizo by Nic Sheff
The reason I so thoroughly enjoyed Schizo by Nic Sheff was how the passage
reflects the way life is perceived through the eyes of a victim of schizophrenia. For
instance, on page 82, the main character, Miles, lists all of the medications he has to
take for his condition—”the four tablets of lithium, the three capsules of Prozac, the two
Lamictal, the two Zyprexa, the two Depakote, and the one Abilify”. On these pages,
Miles has just arrived at a party he was invited to but had no original intentions of
attending. In his spontaneous decision to go, he took all of his medications at once,
though he usually spaces them out due to the unbearable nausea they induce, and
describes the pills as “burning like an oil fire through the lining of my intestines”.
I don’t know much about the likes of schizophrenia and those who suffer from it,
but some of the descriptions in this book make it breath-takingly apparent. Sheff makes
it seem as though schizophrenic people have very active imaginations, when he writes
on page 83 about the continuing images the narrator is seeing as to his reaction to
taking all of the pills at once, combined with the shot from the red plastic cup that was
handed to him:
“...[the shot from the red cup] burns going down and I cough and I feel it like more fire in
my belly. I imagine it mixing together with all the undigested medication, forming this
acid substance that eats through the lining of my stomach and then comes spilling out
through my skin right there onto the dark-colored tile.”
Obviously, nothing like this is going to happen, and the narrator knows that—but
still, not many people would envision that particular scenario as the result of alcohol and
some medication. The narrator (and, consequently, the author) does a very good job of
describing what it’s like to suffer from schizophrenia—the anxieties, the hallucinations,
and everything else encompassed in the everyday life of someone such as Miles.
Overall, I believe the book gives a very open window into the world of a schizophrenic.