Where in the World is Jim Morrison? NOT at Pere Lachaise Anymore!
Thursday October 13th 2005, 7:42 am
Filed under: articles, music, paris, people, stories, travel and places, weird

jimmorrison
my teenage nephews (+ their parents) were in paris visiting a couple of months ago so i went up to hang out with them.

“what do you guys want to do?”

“i want to go to the cemetery, pere lachaise,” says my 13-year old nephew.

“ok. any particular reason?”

“jim morrison!!”

“you KNOW jim morrison?” (thinking this is what his parents would want to see)

THE DOORS! duh.”

i was game (though i’ve been there a few times before) but the plan was immediately nixed by my older sister (his mum). his last attempt, “but mom! CHO…..PIN is there!!” (didn’t work)

no, she probably didn’t want to be reminded of her psychedelic years :)

oh well, we ended up having fun anyway wandering around and eating a lot.

later, i found a virtual tour of pere lachaise online which is pretty extensive and really impressive. i found jim morrison’s grave on it (as well as a biography in french), but you can see any number of the thousands of famous peoples’ graves including, marcel proust, edith piaf, oscar wilde. of course, the cemetery is best viewed in-person.

the famous grave now, however, is apparently not the original tombstone for jim morrison, and has changed over the last 3 decades. in the early years, it was a small concrete block surrounded by seashells. after a while, they added a bust, which was later stolen! though the bust was recovered, they decided not to put it back. the current tombstone is a plain block with a simple engraving as you can see in the photo. the greek inscription at the bottom was added by his father and translates as, “he created his own demons.”

Image
so many people visit jim morrison’s grave, it is absolutely phenomenal. it is THE most visited grave in all of france! however, what comes with all that traffic are hoards of people drinking, smoking, leaving trash and vandalizing not only morrison’s grave but other graves as well. (i.e., lyrics or “i love you” written in lipstick or scratched into tombstones, graffiti all over the cemetary “jim-this way—>” ) it became such a problem for the cemetery, there is now a fence around his grave and a standing guard watching. there are also cameras strategically placed around the cemetery.

his grave is the only grave at pere lachaise that needs to be cleaned every day; all the flowers and trinkets people leave by day’s end is a staggering amount.

only. jim morrison is allegedly no longer buried at pere lachaise. in 2000, the keyboard player for the doors, ray manzarek, reported that morrison’s casket would be removed from pere lachaise at the request of the french government and taken to los angeles. the 30-year lease was up and i guess the cemetery didn’t want them to renew. so, i guess now in 2005, he’s presumably somewhere in l.a. (this is unconfirmed.) many still speculate that he faked his death and will come back using the name, Mr. Mojo Risin (an anagram for jim morrison)…

“Some of the worst mistakes of my life have been haircuts.” –jim morrison

(yeah, i could’ve included a more profound quote but i thought this post need some comic relief)

btw, if you go to pere lachaise in paris, wear good walking shoes and get the cemetery map for 2 euros.

and, for your info if interested, i’ve included a short list of books (biographies and works by jim morrison) and a link to check out some CDs by the doors.

BOOKS
Break on Through: The Life and Death of Jim Morrison by James Riordan
Light My Fire: My Life with The Doors by Ray Manzarek
Mr. Mojo Risin’: Jim Morrison, the Last Holy Fool by David Dalton
The Doors: The Complete Illustrated Lyrics by Danny Sugerman

Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel as a Poet by Wallace Fowlie

CDs
The Best of the Doors

BOOKS BY JIM MORRISON
Lords and the New Creatures
The American Night
The Lost Writings of Jim Morrison

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20 Comments so far
Leave a comment

Curiosity killed the cat! Did it kill James Douglass Morrison? I Don’t think so…I think he just got burned out…and tired of all the shit!

Comment by Peter John Raimo 02.25.07 @ 7:10 pm

maybe YOU’RE him. c’mon mr. mojo, fess up!

Comment by ptinfrance 02.27.07 @ 8:12 pm

I think it would be great to see his grave. i am going a.s.a.p to paris so, i will see him there!

Comment by Amie Newnham 03.22.07 @ 5:40 am

I’ve been to pere lachaise, recently and found it to be one of the most idiosyncratic places on earth!! The elaborate tombstones, and the evocative sensation, you experience while staring at the the tombstone of the greatest rock star ever! I too was dissapointed, by jim morrison’s basic grave. ( dosen’t do him justice) However that dosen’t detract from what a great place it is!!

Comment by George 03.28.07 @ 5:30 pm

amie, glad you’ll be able to make it to pere lachaise!

george, you’re right. pere lachaise is a wonderful albeit unusual place to visit.

Comment by ptinfrance 03.29.07 @ 12:21 am

At the Cemetery of Pere Lachaise,
Lies a grave without a tombstone’s care.
There is a plastic wreath
And scrawls of chalk
Across the mound the stray cats, scavenge
There is no Living prey to stalk,
While the earth consumes the screaming flesh
The voyeurs come from cul de sacs’
To smell the grave and hurry back.
Say music is your only friend,
No epitaph to say the end.
But many for our sins have died
While we into our armchairs slide.
A martyr to our lifelessness,
We see in him it can be done,
Then off to work we must be gone.

Comment by Arthur Rimbaud 2 04.23.07 @ 9:07 pm

ok- Jim Morrison is a complex subject but that is because he was very well protected, regarding his father was an admiral in the American Navy. Not only was he protected here, he was protected by the propoganda media machine that serves the middle and upperclasses, providing them with employment and continued wealth. As well as this he is a 60’s ‘bluesman’ who would refer to black people as ‘niggers’ in his poetry. I have researched the life of Morrison very vigorously and know that he did not have black ‘friends’ except the real bluemen he would visit to see in run-down dives performing their art as he would steal their vocal style and deliveries.
Having been unallowed by the powers that still support Morrison and are fooled into thinking was some kind of revolutionary freedom fighter for truth and right from singing the blues myself for emulating in turn Jim’s own methods of approach to the style and being of mixed race, let me say this, he was a thief and a liar.
His support by workers of black magic and satanism are very unmentioned also. He married a witch that supported his cause and continues to do so today, ie: the continuation of whites to steal from blacks and to keep the people of lower classes unable to show their own strengths and virtues and good grace and beauty, the continuance of their having to work twice as hard as his own classes to access education.
Jim Morrison was a fool and continues to be a fool in Heaven where he is grouped with the artists of the 60’s who are held in awe and respect by the idiots of that era who still are living now and who are in the majority of the population age bracket and cannot bear to let go, even though the 60’s were the era that the blues were made popular by ‘pivotal’ bands who advocated and sung about the effects of LSD. All of these old hippies who pretend that they understand contemporary music and that it is music that is speaking for their era are mistaken. Although ‘influenced’ by the 60’s and Morrison’s little gang, those days are long dead and time is at a different location and standpoint. Music is now universal and practised by all races and produced by all races and is not advocating the use of race theft of modes of expression and then mixing with the educational values put forth by the classes that feed upon the devouring of less priviliged lives which in turn leave out the races that have been stolen from, I find Jim Morrison’s hold on contemporary culture to be a product of criminal values.
One wonders why the story of USA Government testing of LSD and it’s effects by the secret service as use as a weopan of the mind was advocated by the Morrison family and actually pushed onto Jim by them in order that he use his education and good reading to the practical use of continuing to fool the masses into believing that he was speaking for them while in fact he was keeping them locked in place.
I think Jim Morrison was used as a tool of ‘Abraxas’- heaven and hell as one, as a conspiracy to lie and cheat popular culture to be what it is.
Morrison was well known to be a bully, and in terms of popular culture he remains just that. One must just ask the question, if music is available for free download and is so instantly accessible, then why are there so many millionaire lifestyle musicians playing their music in this, I believe heavily guarded industry.
‘The biggest threat to the state is new music’- Plato. The Republic.
ps…Why did the Romans mark AD-Anno Domini, to mark the death of Jesus Christ, somebody they didn’t regard as being the son of God?
Why do we have ‘The Roman Catholic Church’?
Why did Jim not tell us about this?

Comment by Jim Morrison 01.30.08 @ 12:30 am

Just to correct a few of the manifold errors: The inscription in Greek was written by Jim’s father, Admiral Morrison (who has been studying the language in his retirement), and means “Faithful to his own spirit.”
Jim and I were married by a Presbyterian minister in a Celtic Pagan ceremony. No black magic of any sort…we were very much opposed to that sort of thing.
I had a Catholic priest bless the grave, since no religious service was provided by his hooker ex-girlfriend when she hastily interred him there.
He’s still there, and he’s going to stay there; the family have made arrangements with the Pere-Lachaise authorities. Although I am resigned to that (he left instructions with me that he wished to be cremated and scattered off the California coast), at least I know he is well protected from the graverobbing attempts, the idiot fans leaving graffiti and other trash, the drug deals, the hookups…there are cameras, motion sensors and guards, and also spiritual protection.
And those are the facts.

Patricia Kennealy Morrison

Comment by Patricia Morrison 04.09.08 @ 6:58 pm

I went to Pere Lachaise back in February 94-what a beautiful place. I spent the day exploring, and could’ve returned day after day if i’d only had longer. When i went, it was a cold, drizzly day, great- it was mainly free of tourists…

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 8:35 pm

…when i found Jim’s grave it was deserted apart from the sole policeman on guard. I spent a good half hour just standing there, thinking, looking, and being in awe in general, just glad to be there, and happy to be alone. It was amazing…

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 8:42 pm

Bollocks, got called away. Where was i up to? Anyway, i was lucky when i went to Pere Lachaise- it was deserted at Jim’s grave apart from the copper standing guard. I stood there for a good half hour, watching, thinking, just being in awe…

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 9:08 pm

…i couldn’t believe i was there really, and all alone too. Then a big group of Americans appeared. They were SO loud, tramping all over his grave, doing brass rubbings of the headstone, clicking away with their cameras. How disrespectful was that…

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 9:15 pm

..they disgusted me to be honest, and i think it must’ve been the world’s softest French cop, cos he did nothing, just stood there. I remember one of them shrieking ‘THIS IS HIS GIRLFRIEND’S GRAVE!’ about the tomb next to Jims, which of course, it isn’t..

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 9:25 pm

…i told them it wasn’t, but they just looked at me like I was thick, and the idiots carried on clicking away. Then, to top it off, a group of Japanese turned up, Nikons at the ready, and stood there shooting roll after roll of pics. How sad…

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 9:32 pm

…so i took a last look at Jim’s grave and left then. Patricia Morrison, i’m reading your book, Strange Days, at the moment, and i understand why you wish he wasn’t there. What a crappy funeral he had, they didn’t give a shit, did they?…

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 9:39 pm

… Their only concern was to get it over with and get Pam back to America, away from any awkward questions. I believe Pam was responsible for Jim’s death, deliberate or not, she put him where he is now. Patricia, i have total respect for you…

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 9:46 pm

…You are Jim’s other half, his true soulmate, his wife, his partner, his real love. Respect to you for that. Hope you don’t mind me saying that.

Comment by Michelle 05.04.08 @ 9:52 pm

i just recently visited jims grave in paris,i felt he wasnt there,i didnt get that feeling of awe i expected to get either.its a funny thing but my own spirit told me he was elsewhere.i enjoyed the experience however.as for jims life, what can one say.ive read so many books on him and listened to so many thoughts of others who knew him,i came to this conclusion: no-one really knew him that well,he was very mysterious,i personally think there was a satanic connection and i do believe pamela was responsible for his death without doubt which is why she rarely spoke about it.i would love to hear what his father has to say about him as he too rarely speaks.but one thing everyone seems to forget regarding jim was that after all said and done he was only human made of flesh and blood, no matter what he achieved (or didnt) may he rest in peace.

Comment by jon 08.16.08 @ 5:25 am

I saw the Doors in Coconut Grove when Jim got arrested..for really nothing I might add. I now have been to his grave site….I am not sure what to think now as I did not know what to think then…I know one thing….he was much smarter then I.

Comment by David 01.15.09 @ 3:02 pm

Well, to begin at the beginning and parade to stop- I truly believe that Jim was put to pay by his own press. Straight from UCLA into a world-domineering band and then to become a poet, Jim is an interesting find to any college grad!
Anyway, after extensive research over many years (and most having Jims’ best interests at heart); I felt that I had skipped many parts of the puzzle that make the final segments of this man(?)
The unknown soldier, was in fact, Jim Morrison, whose father actually was a causal person pivotal in the inception of the Vietnam War.
Pls google Admiral George Morrison Gulf of Tonkin.
This makes for a rather comical view of the plight of Jim, a revolutionary figure who shook the foundation to it’s depths whilst being placed there by his fathers’ money and all.
Being a musician- google catgotwasted – and something of a burr in Jim’s beaver, subject to music industry hexes and fuck knows what else, I am ashamed to even still have a tiny liking of the man still.
He sits on my couch in my studio attcking me spiritually and is fed by his popular stronghold on society like many of the 60’s people who are dominant in our generation.
Hello Patricia; I spoke to an image of you on a pub tabletop before being barred from that place after many a time being isolated from public meeting houses as such in this town.
We had a brief chat and after going for another beer, was promptly shown the door for ‘talking to myself!’
Well Patricia; I would love to chat about my situation and what else I know about this man and all else and would be very open to that if you add me at myspace.com/catgotwasted3
I am somewhat bemused by the whole thing more than being angry and see myself assomething of an Omen II
Anyhow, goodluck on your meeting-places adjoined without ceremony or lack of intercourse.
Yours truly,
Ralph Essex

Comment by Ralph 11.19.09 @ 12:17 pm



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