Works
Wilderness: The Lost Writings of Jim Morrison
Jim MorrisonWilderness: The Lost Writings of Jim Morrison
Jim MorrisonFamous Jim Morrison Quotes
“I like people who shake other people up and make them feel uncomfortable.”
Source: Eyes: Poetry, 1967-1971
Jim Morrison Quotes about death
An American Prayer (1978)
Context: The program for this evening
is not new. You have seen
This entertainment through and through.
You've seen your birth, your
life and death; you might recall
all of the rest — (did you
have a good world when you
died?) — enough to base
a movie on?
Jim Morrison Quotes about people
“People are strange when you're a stranger
Faces look ugly when you're alone”
"People Are Strange" on the album Strange Days (1967)
Context: People are strange when you're a stranger
Faces look ugly when you're alone
Women seem wicked when you're unwanted
Streets are uneven when you're down.
Jim Morrison: Trending quotes
Jim Morrison Quotes
"Five to One" on the album Waiting for the Sun (1968)
Variant: Five to one, baby
One in five
No one here gets out alive
Context: Five to one, baby
One in five
No one here gets out alive, now
You get yours, baby
I'll get mine
Gonna make it, baby
If we try.
“Let me tell you about heartache and the loss of god”
An American Prayer (1978)
Context: Now listen to this...
Ill tell you about texas radio and the big beat
Soft driven, slow and mad Like some new language
Reaching your head with the cold, sudden fury of a divine messenger
Let me tell you about heartache and the loss of god
Wandering, wandering in hopeless night
Out here in the perimeter there are no stars...
Out here we is stoned...
Immaculate.
As quoted in Straight Whisky: A Living History of Sex, Drugs, and Rock 'n' Roll on the Sunset Strip (2003), by Erik Quisling, and Austin Lowry Williams p. 152
“Indian, Indian what did you die for?
Indian says, nothing at all.”
An American Prayer (1978)
“I'll never wake up in a good mood again.
I'm tired of these stinky boots”
Source: An American Prayer
“No one thought up being. He who thinks he has, step forward.”
Source: Wilderness: The Lost Writings, Vol. 1
“There's a killer on the road
His brain is squirming like a toad.”
"Riders on the Storm" from the album L.A. Woman (1971).
Variant: Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free.
“There are things known
and there are things unknown
and in between are the doors.”
Aldous Huxley, using the term "the doors of perception" which originated with William Blake in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. It is sometimes credited to Morrison because he cited it in interviews as the inspiration for the name The Doors and without always crediting Huxley as the source.
Misattributed
Variant: There are things known and there are things unknown, and in between are the doors of perception.
Source: Letters from Joe
The Lords and the New Creatures: Poems (1969), The New Creatures
As quoted in Jim Morrison: Ten Years Gone (1981) by Lizzie James writing for Creem Magazine http://archives.waiting-forthe-sun.net/Pages/Interviews/JimInterviews/TenYearsGone.html <br class="br">Context: 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.
“Now listen to this…
Ill tell you about texas radio and the big beat”
An American Prayer (1978)
Context: Now listen to this...
Ill tell you about texas radio and the big beat
Soft driven, slow and mad Like some new language
Reaching your head with the cold, sudden fury of a divine messenger
Let me tell you about heartache and the loss of god
Wandering, wandering in hopeless night
Out here in the perimeter there are no stars...
Out here we is stoned...
Immaculate.
The Lords and the New Creatures: Poems (1969), The Lords: Notes on Vision
Context: Few would defend a small view of Alchemy as "Mother of Chemistry", and confuse its true goal with those external metal arts. Alchemy is an erotic science, involved in buried aspects of reality, aimed at purifying and transforming all being and matter. Not to suggest that material operations are ever abandoned. The adept holds to both the mystical and physical work.
“Don't worry, the operation won't take long and you'll feel much better in the morning.”
Onstage introduction to The Celebration of the Lizard
Context: Alright listen man, we got a special treat for you now. This is a little tour-de-force that we've only done a couple times in front of strangers, and it starts off kinda quiet, so if everybody just kinda relax, take a few deep breaths, think about your eventual end and what's gonna happen tonight; and we'll try and do something good to your head, right man?
I don't know if you're aware of it, but this whole evening is being taped for eternity and beyond that too. And so listen man, if you want to be represented in eternity with some uncouth language then I hope you'll stand up on the top of your seat and shout it out very clearly or we're not going to get it on tape.
Don't worry, the operation won't take long and you'll feel much better in the morning.
The Lords and the New Creatures: Poems (1969), The Lords: Notes on Vision
Context: The Lords. Events take place beyond our knowledge or control. Our lives are lived for us. We can only try to enslave others. But gradually, special perceptions are being developed. The idea of the "Lords" is beginning to form in some minds. We should enlist them into bands of perceivers to tour the labyrinth during their mysterious nocturnal appearances. The Lords have secret entrances and they know disguises. But they give themselves away in minor ways. Too much glint of light in the eye. A wrong gesture. Too long and curious a glance.
“Death makes angels of us all
and gives us wings
where we had shoulders
smooth as raven's
claws”
An American Prayer (1978)
Variant: Death makes angels of us all
and gives us wings
where we had shoulders
smooth a raven´s claws…
Source: Wilderness: The Lost Writings, Vol. 1
“I'll tell you this —
No eternal reward will forgive us now for wasting the dawn.”
"The Wasp (Texas Radio And The Big Beat)" on the albums L. A. Woman (1971) and An American Prayer (1978)
Variant: No heavenly power will forgive us now for wasting the dawn.
“This is the strangest life I’ve ever known.”
"Waiting for the Sun" on the album Morrison Hotel (1970)
“You live you die and death not ends it.”
An American Prayer (1978)
Variant: We live, we die
and death not ends it
Context: O great creator of being
grant us one more hour to
perform our art
and perfect our lives The moths & atheists are doubly divine
& dying
We live, we die
and death not ends it
