Reading Reflection On The Soloist By Steve Lopez

What I enjoyed most in reading the story of Steve Lopez and Nathaniel Ayers within the book The Soloist, were the great metaphors and lessons for life within the story.

Steve, a columnist for the Los Angeles Times, notices a homeless on the street and is drawn to him through the man’s beautiful ability to play the violin. Despite the fact that Nathaniel’s violin only had two strings, he was still able to display his talent that once had him in a top music school, Juilliard School in New York.

Initially, Lopez viewed Nathaniel as interesting story that he could write about for one of his newspaper columns. What he didn’t know, was that he would eventually go beyond all measure to help this man get his life back into order, and free him of the demons in schizophrenia that ultimately drove him away from a promising music career.

The way in which Steve helps Nathaniel speaks a lot about his own character, and his ability to see the good in people, even a homeless, schizophrenic man.

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It is a quality that is very inspiring to read about and highlights the good that exists in people. It also acknowledges a strong topic in mental health and how drastically it can affect the lives of individuals. Schizophrenia is one of the most well-known and surprisingly frequent psychological disorders today. Patients who have this disorder have problems separating reality from fantasy or delusion. Typically, the person with schizophrenia starts off with a small paranoia about something or someone and continues to get more and more problematic until he or she has trouble functioning in the real world due to emotional, physical, mental, or financial reasons.

Because of this, most people who have schizophrenia are unable to keep a job, Nathaniel in this book.

This book shows how a disorder such as schizophrenia can turn a person’s life upside down, sometimes in as little as a few weeks. At the same time, this book does an awesome job of displaying the value in a true friendship. Despite the fact that Steve and Nathaniel’s relationship found several difficulties along the way, Steve’s ability to look past some of Nathaniel’s unwelcoming ways support how much a true friendship is really worth and what it could mean in certain cases. Mr. Lopez reflects over the street situation that the people up-high in Los Angeles forgot. Chapter 7, page 71 “I walk Skid Row for ninety minutes, past hundreds of campers. They’re in doorways and boxes, slumped over in wheelchairs. I’m angry about billions spent in Iraq while bomb-rattled vets live like animals on Skid Row. ” I found this quote interesting because it highlights a few harsh realities that exist in life and how human beings often do not receive that help in which they desperately need.

Another interesting aspect of that can be seen through reading the book is no matter where a person ends up, the value in a person finding something he or she is passionate about can transcend through anything. Nathaniel is a homeless man, but still manages to recite his passion for music on a two string violin. The importance in finding a passion however, is using it in a way that can help you put it to use in a beneficial way.