Jim Morrison: the articulation of the Shaman- Poet in the poetic tradition

Abstract

This dissertation aims at the articulation ofthe shaman-poet in the poetic tradition. It presents American poet Jim Morrison as the shaman artist whose life and poetry are analyzed as belonging to the tradition ofpoets Plato called possessed byfuror poeiicus. This tradition, which is to find its prime in the writings ofthe Romantic poets, states that poetry is a secret language, based on feeling and imagination, that speaks to the heart of men about the sacred and universal, i. e., natural, quality of the human soul. The shaman-poet, thus, belongs to a tradition that goes back thousands ofyears to a time when the primitive man used to be in touch with a magical understanding ofhis environment on a regular basis, in contrast to the extremely rational perception ofthe world by modem man. The poetry ofJim Morrison is presented here as a representative ofthis sacred language that tells of this magical perception, long-forgotten, though never completely erased fi"om the human mind. Hence, it is to be seen not only as a bridge to the spiritual realm offeeling and imagination, but also as a technique for ecological survival in this current rational and secular era.