Tragic Genius: Quotes from Jim Morrison

Jim Morrison
US rock singer (1943 - 1971)

Death is only going to happen to you once; I don't want to miss it.

Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free.

Hatred is a very underestimated emotion.

I think of myself as an intelligent, sensitive human being with the soul of a clown which always forces me to blow it at the most important moments.

Violence isn't always evil. What's evil is the infatuation with violence.

Some of the worst mistakes of my life have been haircuts.

People are afraid of themselves, of their own reality; their feelings most of all. People talk about how great love is, but that's bullshit. Love hurts. Feelings are disturbing. People are taught that pain is evil and dangerous. How can they deal with love if they're afraid to feel? Pain is meant to wake us up. People try to hide their pain. But they're wrong. Pain is something to carry, like a radio. You feel your strength in the experience of pain. It's all in how you carry it. That's what matters. Pain is a feeling. Your feelings are a part of you. Your own reality. If you feel ashamed of them, and hide them, you're letting society destroy your reality. You should stand up for your right to feel your pain.

I believe in a long, prolonged, derangement of the senses in order to obtain the unknown.

I see myself as a huge fiery comet, a shooting star. Everyone stops, points up and gasps "Oh look at that!" Then- whoosh, and I'm gone...and they'll never see anything like it ever again... and they won't be able to forget me- ever.

That's what real love amounts to- letting a person be what he really is.

Love cannot save you from your own fate.

The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You trade in your sense for an act. You give up your ability to feel, and in exchange, put on a mask. There can't be any large-scale revolution until there's a personal revolution, on and individual level. It's got to happen inside first. You can take away a man's political freedom and you won't hurt him- unless you take away his freedom to feel. That can destroy him. That kind of freedom can't be granted. Nobody can win it for you.


I like people who shake other people up and make them feel uncomfortable.

People fear death even more than pain. It's strange that they fear death. Life hurts a lot more than death. At the point of death, the pain is over. Yeah, I guess it is a friend...

The most loving parents and relatives commit murder with smiles on their faces. They force us to destroy the person we really are: a subtle kind of murder.

A friend is someone who gives you total freedom to be yourself.

Actually I don't remember being born, it must have happened during one of my black outs.

Blake said that the body was the soul's prison unless the five senses are fully developed and open. He considered the senses the 'windows of the soul.' When sex involves all the senses intensely, it can be like a mystical experence.

Death makes angels of us all and gives us wings where we had shoulders smooth as ravens claws.

Each generation wants new symbols, new people, new names. They want to divorce themselves from their predecessors.

I am interested in anything about revolt, disorder, chaos-especially activity that seems to have no meaning. It seems to me to be the road toward freedom... Rather than starting inside, I start outside and reach the mental through the physical.

I believe in a long, prolonged derangement of the senses to attain the unknown. Our pale reasoning hides the infinite from us.

I like any reaction I can get with my music.

Just anything to get people to think. I mean if you can get a whole room full of drunk, stoned people to actually wake up and think, you're doing something.

I think in art, but especially in films, people are trying to confirm their own existences.

Music inflames temperament.

Sex is full of lies. The body tries to tell the truth. But, it's usually too battered with rules to be heard, and bound with pretenses so it can hardly move. We cripple ourselves with lies.

The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You give up your ability to feel, and in exchange, put on a mask.

When you make your peace with authority, you become authority.

Where's your will to be weird?

Whoever controls the media, controls the mind.

We fear violence less than our own feelings. Personal, private, solitary pain is more terrifying than what anyone else can inflict.