Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel as Poet [Paperback]

Wallace Fowlie (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 24, 1994

"The poet makes himself into a visionary by a long derangement of all the senses."—Rimbaud

In 1968 Jim Morrison, founder and lead singer of the rock band the Doors, wrote to Wallace Fowlie, a scholar of French literature and a professor at Duke University. Morrison thanked Fowlie for producing an English translation of the complete poems of Rimbaud. He needed the translation, he said, because, "I don’t read French that easily. . . . I am a rock singer and your book travels around with me." Fourteen years later, when Fowlie first heard the music of the Doors, he recognized the influence of Rimbaud in Morrison’s lyrics.
In Rimbaud and Jim Morrison Fowlie, a master of the form of the memoir, reconstructs the lives of the two youthful poets from a personal perspective. In their twinned stories he discovers an uncanny symmetry, a pattern far richer than the simple truth that both led lives full of adventure and both made poetry of their thirst for the liberation of the self. The result is an engaging account of the connections between an exceptional French symbolist who gave up writing poetry at the age of twenty, died young, and whose poems are still avidly read to this day, and an American rock musician whose brief career ignited an entire generation and has continued to fascinate millions around the world in the twenty years since his death in Paris. In this dual portrait, Fowlie gives us a glimpse of the affinities and resemblances between European literary traditions and American rock music and youth culture in the late twentieth century.
A personal meditation on two unusual, yet emblematic, cultural figures, this book also stands as a summary of a noted scholar’s lifelong reflections on creative artists.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Fowlie, a leading translator of Arthur Rimbaud and professor emeritus of French literature at Duke, here attempts to trace the aesthetic affinities between the French symbolist poet and '60s rock icon and Doors lead singer, Jim Morrison. Fowlie contends that both Rimbaud, the iconoclastic young poet who at the age of 20 forsook poetry for a peripatetic life as a merchant-adventurer and Morrison, the macho, nihilistic, self-styled shaman of late-'60s acid rock, refigure the boyish archetypes of the clown and the rebel; for Fowlie, both were restive, bohemian, visionary poets who attained an extraordinary, posthumous mythical status. He prefaces his readings of Rimbaud's and Morrison's "poetry" with a brief memoir stressing his pedagogical aims: to recruit readers of French poetry among jaded kids who can only deal with high culture in the context of familiar pop cultural icons. Missing from this study, however, is a critical perspective of the tawdrier aspects of Morrison's fame, which sprang, in part, from his talent for turning avant-garde and multicultural tropes into psychedelic cliches. Fowlie's style is lucid and highly personal, if humorless. Readers who are not fans of the Doors may roll their eyes at Fowlie's earnest attempts to explicate their lyrics in terms of Nietzsche, Antonin Artaud and ancient mythology.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

Attempting to reconcile the life of a 19th-century French poet with that of an American rock star/poet of the 1960s can be a daring juggling act. In this dual portrayal of Rimbaud and Morrison, Fowlie (Duke Univ.) mostly succeeds in reconstructing their twinned stories, which are rich in uncanny symmetries, among them adventure, rebellion, a brief but rich career, public admiration, and the early death both cult figures experienced. Morrison read and admired Rimbaud, after whom he modeled his life. In this literary analysis, Fowlie seeks to bring out affinities and similarities in their poetry and lyrics. The result is an interesting if curious reading of Rimbaud and Morrison that would appeal to both Doors fans and readers of French symbolism. Recommended for large collections.
Ali Houissa, Cornell Univ., Ithaca, N.Y.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Duke University Press Books (June 24, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0822314452
• ISBN-13: 978-0822314455
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #157,337 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars An Interesting Memoir Padded with Derivative Commentary, May 27, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel as Poet (Paperback)

Wallace Fowlie, a French scholar, translator and commentator on many French poets, has written this short book on the connections between the lives and writings of Rimbaud and Morrison, two symbols of youthful, creative rebellion who lived more than a century apart. Unfortunately, while the short memoir of how Fowlie first came to connect these two figures is interesting and worthy of a short journalistic piece, the bulk of this book contains nothing more than truncated and regurgitated biographical sketches of Rimbaud and Morrison and disparate commentary on some of their writing. Fowlie, who published an English translation of Rimbaud's collected poems in 1966, first heard of Morrison when he received a letter from him in 1968 thanking him for the English translation. Morrison implied that Rimbaud was an important writer for him: "I don't read French that easily . . . I am a rock singer and your book travels around with me." Fowlie didn't know of Morrison until, many years later, he heard some of the music and lyrics of The Doors and recognized the influence of Rimbaud on the writing of Morrison. Fowlie's memoir relates how his discovery of these connections led to a series of lectures on Rimbaud and Morrison, lectures which were (not surprisingly!) received with enthusiasm and interest by his young college students at Duke and elsewhere. Fowlie's discussion of Rimbaud's poetry, in addition to being cursory, can only be understood with a copy of his poems close at hand; without reading the poems in their entirety, Fowlie's commentary is largely unintelligible. With respect to Morrison, Fowlie does nothing more than regurgitate biographical details gleaned from other authors and discuss a few of Morrison's poems. Again, understanding the discussion of the poems suffers if you don't have the texts of Morrison's poems available. While Fowlie's prose is wonderful and his brief anecdote of the way that Morrison and Rimbaud connected in Fowlie's own life interesting, the bulk of the book in unremarkable and derivative.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Fowlie Knowledgeable About Rimbaud, But..., November 25, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel as Poet (Paperback)

Wallace Fowlie seems like a sweet man, but as he would admit himself, he knows very little about Jim Morrison. His book, though somewhat interesting, is ridiculously full of simplistic error on matters Morrisonian, such as his statement that "L.A. Woman" is the least-praised album ever put out by the doors (Dr. Fowlie, that would be "The Soft Parade,") and numerous other boo-boos that render many of his conclusions somewhat dubious. It's a gentle ramble, but not serious analysis; a curiosity more than an academic study.

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars an interesting novelty, but nothing special, November 5, 2001

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J from NY (New York) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Rimbaud and Jim Morrison: The Rebel as Poet (Paperback)

if wallace fowlie was going to write a book about the similarities between arthur rimbaud and jim morrison, couldn't he have at the very least learned just a few things about morrison and wrote some new thoughts or little known facts about rimbaud, rather than just cutting and pasting from his old study of the surrealist legend? anyone who is even mildly acquainted with his work on the adolescent rimbaud will have at first a strange but strong sensation of deja vu while reading this book, and if they have a decent memory, will realize that most of the passages in this book were lifted from his earlier work. some people will see this as acceptable because most of the info and commentary is poignant and accurate (if not very penetrating and a tad superficial), but i find it a little disrespectful to the reader. as if we're not going to notice it when he rewrites, word by word, his previous work. it does have it's merits, and it is fairly entertaining to read his accounts of college lectures given on the two poets of youthful rebellion and the ideological similarities between the 60's counterculture and the philosophy of the surrealists, but there simply isn't enough substantial, original stuff in the book to make it truly memorable. it is worth reading, but only just.