Jim Morrison, Writer: The Private Journals of the Lizard King

Above all, he wanted to be remembered as a writer. The singer and founder of The Doors, one of the most influential rock stars in history, would have preferred to simply be called a writer. And we wouldn't be lying, because he wrote non-stop all his life.

A wandering child (his military father was constantly changing assignments) and a voracious reader, he empathized with the cursed poets he discovered very early on. Rimbaud was a great favorite, and Nietzsche a powerful inspiration for his future volcanic personality. In this 'Collected Works' (Libros del Kultrum) of more than 500 pages, translated by Miquel Izquierdo, there are remote things: fans of the group will find, for example, the poem 'Horse latitudes' years before it was recorded for the second Doors album in the form of an unstoppable sonic tornado. Thanks to context notes, taken from interviews with Morrison, we discover that he wrote it in high school, where he already had a good number of notebooks full of ideas. In a fit of rage, he destroyed them all: "I can't think of anything I wanted more than to have those notebooks. I even thought about taking sodium pentothal or being hypnotized to try to remember them."

One of the prologues is by Jim's sister, Annie. She tells a symptomatic episode of Morrison's secrecy with his family: she lived across the Atlantic, in London, where at that time 'Light my fire' was playing everywhere. She only knew the voice was her brother's when her mother sent her the first LP of the Doors, with an imposing cover photo where it was impossible not to recognize him. That album began with the band's great invitation, the hand extended to discover a new world: 'Break on through (to the other side)'.

Expand

John Densmore was a drummer inspired by jazz, Robbie Krieger knew how to play some flamenco on the guitar, and Ray Manzarek incorporated the organs and keyboards that rounded out a distinctive sound. These elements set them apart from other bands of the era, but they would have been nothing without Morrison, his attitude and presence, his oddity, and also his lyrical content. The same first album ended with 'The end', the famous version of the Oedipus myth that appeared—cut down—in 'Apocalypse Now' a decade later.

'The celebration of the lizard'

Almost all of The Doors' albums (six in four years) ended with a long track like 'The end'. They are 'When the music's over', 'The soft parade' or the famous 'Riders on the storm'. But there is one more, special, that was left out of the third: 'The celebration of the lizard'. This 17-minute odyssey condensed Morrison's best lyrics and his fetish themes: reptiles, deserts, rituals, shamans, madness. "I am the Lizard King: I can do anything." It wasn't until 2003 that a studio version was published, a convincing patchwork of cuts and tests. The book shows photos of the original notebook where it was written, and an interview where the aura of this song is dismantled, of which Morrison says: "It's all rather mocking. I get the impression that people don't realize. It's not to be taken seriously. It's like if you play the villain in a western, it's meant to be ironic."

Expand

Before succeeding, Morrison studied film in Los Angeles (very close to Francis Ford Coppola, by the way), and from that period a film treatment remains, that is, the step before a film script: 'The Hitchhiker'. Morrison was interested in cinema because it is "the artistic approach closest we have to the real flow of consciousness." He did manage to shoot about fifty minutes in this universe of roads and deserts, easily found on YouTube, where he played a mysterious protagonist very close to the characters of Jack Kerouac.

Another focus of interest is in the 'Miami Trial Diaries'. Morrison, locked in the Kafkaesque judicial system for public scandal, observes it with the eyes of a jester and pours into his diaries poems and fascinating impressions. Convinced that if he didn't have money he would have ended up in prison, and that it was a great waste of time, in the diaries we read phrases like a witness "fiddles with an imaginary mustache" next to others like "suddenly, a dim public corridor becomes a piece of eternity."

Expand

Morrison published a couple of poetry books in his lifetime while already a star ('The New Creatures' and 'The Lords'), but he did so in small print runs to give away to his acquaintances. Publishers such as Fundamentos or Espiral, and also the magazine Star, later translated them in Spain.

Death in Paris

After recording the sixth album, 'L.A. Woman', Morrison told the band that he wanted to move to Paris, where he would also, of course, write diaries that are preserved. Paris, like Hemingway, like Cortázar, like Fitzgerald or Miles Davis. Before that, by the way, he stopped in Spain, at El Prado (especially for the 'Garden of Earthly Delights', by Bosch) and at the Alhambra with Washington Irving's tales in hand. In the French capital, he tried unsuccessfully to quit alcohol, and recorded sessions of recited poetry that would also be published later.

Expand

He was the third rockstar to die at 27, after Joplin and Hendrix, in his apartment and without an autopsy. It was July 1971. His grave in Père Lachaise is a tourist attraction, and the sculpted bust that it had disappeared from 1988 until this year, found by chance. Weeks before, the city council had just proposed naming a bridge over the Seine in his honor. On the facade of the building where he died, on Rue Beautreillis, there is today a spontaneous sign from a neighbor tired of the mythomania towards the singer. It reads: "Cézanne and Baudelaire also lived on this street." Cézanne, Baudelaire, and a writer.

Session limit reached

Access to Premium content is open as a courtesy of the establishment where you are, but currently there are too many users connected at the same time.

Please try again in a few minutes.

Session closed

When logging in from a different device, for security, the last session on this one was closed.

To continue enjoying your digital subscription, log in on this device.

Do you have a subscription? Log in