Mr Mojo Read Free Page A

They finish a packet of Camel filters before smoking it. Natalie,Fred and Oliver all live nearby, and come to the cemetery every day. They always meet at Morrison’s grave, because, they say, ‘We like his history, he was a rebel.’ They’re thinking of not coming any more, because the place is always swamped by tourists. ‘And the police come every five minutes,’ says Natalie, ‘it’s getting to be a drag. I’m not sure if it’s cool to hang out here anymore.’
    A frail-looking couple dressed entirely in black amble up to the throng. The boy holds a bunch of flowers. They stare for a minute and then start to walk away. ‘The flowers are for Oscar Wilde,’ says Jeremy, a nineteen-year-old from Manhattan. The girl, also from New York, is called Kris. ‘Jim Morrison gets all the attention,’ she says, ‘so we thought we’d visit Wilde. Anyway, it looks like we’re gatecrashing a party here.’
    Photographers and backpackers come and go, cautiously approaching the grave in case they’re intruding; some scan the cemetery guide, perhaps wondering why Morrison’s name is misspelt Morisson; the security guards drive past again and the day draws to a close. It seems like Morrison’s grave is the longest running open-air nightclub in Europe.
    As the wind gets up, Blue slowly turns to say goodbye. ‘I don’t think I’ll be coming again,’ she says. ‘This place is like a garbage tip now.’
    There are as many rumours about Jim Morrison’s death as there are about his life. Not only are the circumstances in which he died incredibly suspect, but so are the many things which are supposed to have befallen him since. You can take your pick: he is still alive; his body was stolen by friends soon after his death and shipped back to California; he was cremated and his ashes eventually smoked by Morrison’s Parisian heroin dealer; his ashes were scattered over the Seine. One journalist was even told by a guard at Père-Lachaise that Morrison’s family came and collected the body at the beginning of the eighties. Graffiti near the grave states, ‘We came to see you, Jim, even though we know you’re not there’ – but this is wishful thinking. By keeping their options open Morrison obsessives can perpetuate the myth, which becomes dramatically less mysterious if you believe he is buried at Père-Lachaise. But there seems little doubt that he is.
    Monsieur Forestier, the custodian of the cemetery, was shocked when asked whether Morrison was buried there. ‘Of course he’s there, he’s always been there. Only the bust has been removed.’ He even refutes the story about the family retrieving the body: ‘Even they can’t take away the body, they’re officially not allowed to. You can’t just pick up bodies and move them somewhere else. He’s here.’
    Should we believe this? Certainly the custodians of Père-Lachaise didn’t have the same qualms when theymoved Molière, Beaumarchais and Abelard to attract attention to their cemetery; and bodies are moved from cemeteries all the time (often to make way for real estate). It’s also possible that Admiral Steve Morrison’s contacts allowed him to secretly move his son’s body back to the USA.
    But if Morrison’s body isn’t there, why do they claim it is? One of the most densely populated cemeteries in the world, Père-Lachaise is not starved of tourists, and the graves of Oscar Wilde and Edith Piaf alone would keep it full of visitors. It’s not as if the authorities need Jim Morrison. The surrounding graves have to be regularly cleaned, and the guards could find better things to do with their time than patrol Morrison’s tomb on the lookout for deviants. Monsieur Forestier simply doesn’t need the trouble, so why should he lie?
    Two hours later the grave is littered with flowers: