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Angels Dance And Angels Die: The Tragic Romance of Pamela and Jim Morrison

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Revised for 2007! This softcover edition examines the turbulent relationship between legendary Doors frontman Jim Morrison and his common-law wife, Pamela Courson, tracing the lives of Courson and Morrison before their fateful meeting in 1965, their lives together until Morrison's death in 1971, and Courson's life without Morrison, including her fight to gain the rights to his estate until her death from a heroin overdose on April 25, 1974.

240 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1998

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Patricia Butler

28 books5 followers

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Displaying 1 - 30 of 70 reviews
Profile Image for Persephone's Pomegranate.
108 reviews620 followers
July 30, 2023
Angels Dance and Angels Die is one of the prettiest books I own. Look at this beauty:

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“I got this little girl.“

“Oh, yeah?“

“Yeah.“ There was a glint in his eye. “She's wonderful…“ A sly smile had crept over his face as though he were picturing the girl's soft, pale skin, sea-colored eyes, and hair touched with fire. “… She's trouble.“

“Well shit, Morrison,“ January deadpanned, “I guess it oughta work out just fine then.“


Romeo and Juliet if they were neurotic hippie rockers. That is how I would describe Jim and Pam. He was rock and roll's Lizard King, and she was his long-time partner and muse.

I find Pamela just as fascinating as Jim, if not more so. Many of Morrison's die-hard fans enjoy hating her and putting her down. They either insult her or completely ignore her importance. Yes, the couple had a toxic relationship. But they were also soulmates. There's a reason why he left everything in his will to Pamela.

I'm tired of women being blamed for everything.

Yoko : DID SOMEONE CALL MY NAME?

Society puts musicians on a pedestal. But at the same time, it demonizes their significant others. If Jim Morrison were still alive, he'd tell you to keep his common-law wife's name out of your mouth.

James Douglas Morrison was born an Army Brat in Melbourne, Florida. Pamela Susan Courson was from Weed, California. At first glance, they didn't have much in common. Pamela had her interests, and Jim had his. They were on different paths. But fate had other plans. It was a passionate love affair right from the start. They loved. They fought. They broke up. They got back together. They were good for each other. They were bad for each other. They were villains. They were angels. They read poetry. They frolicked around Paris. They enjoyed each other's company. They ruined each other's lives.

Toxic, yes, but also strangely romantic.

Although they were never married, Jim considered Pamela to be his cosmic mate. Growing old was never on the cards for this troubled couple. They both died tragically young. Jim died of heart failure at the age of 27. To put it crudely, he drank himself to an early grave. Pamela died of a heroin overdose three years later. It may not have been a Hollywood ending, but it was a rock n roll one.

Oliver Stone made a movie about The Doors in 1991 with Val Kilmer as Jim and Meg Ryan as Pamela.

Jim is buried in the famed Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris. Pamela's final resting place is at Fairhaven Memorial Park in Santa Ana, California.

a-jim-pam

Jim and Pamela took great pleasure in trying to scare each other, popping out of dark shadows, waving knives, or playing chicken in the car on the steep cliffs of canyon roads. They were like children left unattended, reveling in their youth, their freedom, and each other, sometimes risking their lives for an even greater thrill. They were going to play until there was no sand left in the box.

Jim said that Pamela was the one who had gotten under his skin, that she was his cosmic mate. He considered her to be his cosmic counterpart. He felt that he couldn’t live without her, that she was the one that he always returned to and she was the complement to his existence.

‘I’ll just this about that,’ he wrote of their lopsided union, 'I was the mouse who caught the cat.’

Profile Image for Mark Laflamme.
Author 11 books30 followers
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November 6, 2010
After "No One Here Gets Out Alive" laid bare the hedonistic and troubled history of Jim Morrison and the Doors, it seemed all available information had been served up for the public appetite and there was nothing left to say. Numerous volumes on the topic followed but most only echoed what had already been said. For nearly three decades, "No One Here" has remained the ultimate guide to the enigmatic singer and his long-suffering band.
It feels vaguely traitorous to say so but I'm going to do it anyway: "Angels Dance and Angels Die" may be the most gripping and insightful book yet on the subject of Morrison and his screaming shaman's dance through rock and roll history. Where the earlier work provided a chronicle of the band's rise to the top and more than a few glimpses behind the stage curtains, "Angels Dance" achieves something more significant. It studies the motivations, flaws and personal history that made Jim Morrison the kind of man and artist whose popularity continues to mushroom nearly four decades after his death.
Much of Patricia Butler's beautifully written book focuses on the stormy relationship between Jim and his cosmic mate Pamela Courson. But it is more than a blow-by-blow photo album of dish hurling fights and lurid infidelities. Butler writes with unflagging objectivity and offers up her views only when those views are supported by sources who knew Jim or Pam or both as intimately as anyone alive. The result is a book that's both illuminating and powerful, a rock and roll love story like none ever told.
My wife is a mild Doors fan who mostly tolerates my own tenacious adoration of the group. She has no interest in "No One Here Gets Out Alive" or any of the numerous rockographies that followed it. "Angels Dance" appeals to her though, because it is a story of genuine love that exists in spite of the many pitfalls of the rock and roll universe, which is not a place that has proven friendly to enduring romance. With that kind of broader audience, Butler's book may prove to be durable as well, and deservedly so. She reports and writes with the flair of a seasoned journalist yet there is no shortage of drama and poetry here. "Angels Dance and Angels Die" should be regarded as essential reading for anyone who remains fascinated by the Morrison legend. From the first page to the last, this one is as intriguing, mysterious and brilliant as the notes from Ray Manzarek's keyboard.
Profile Image for Lauren.
19 reviews55 followers
December 5, 2013
I absolutely loved this. I learnt some things about Jim that I never knew about before and it certainly made me understand why he acted the way he did during the last years of his life.

I think Pam & Jim were soulmates and they always will be. they were perfect for each other. I love the idea that they went through so much together, yet in the end they stayed together because their love outweighed all of the bad times.
Profile Image for Lynx.
198 reviews113 followers
November 16, 2017
While the stories of how they met may differ, one thing was clear from the very beginning – Jim and Pam were meant to be. Jim was only beginning to move into music then, his band The Doors working hard to build a career. Pamela was with him every step of the way not only supporting his dreams but becoming muse for both his lyrics and poetry. They became a famous duo among the Laurel Canyon crowd, living in “the house on Love Street”. While they were famous for being great lovers they were also famous for their constant fights and Jim’s out of control alcohol use. As Pamela once said, “There were a lot of people who pretended to be close to Jim, but I was the only one who had the nerve to stand up to him.” They may both have had a dark side, but their love for one another was pure. Pamela was one of the very few people Jim trusted to bare his true self to and they both knew no matter how many fights, or flings the pair may have had, they would always have each other.

As The Doors rose to great success so did Jim’s alcoholism, leading to tensions within the band as well as numerous arrests and court cases. By 1971, Jim & Pamela knew in order to regain control of their lives, they had to get away from the chaos surrounding them. They decided to move to Paris, even though they both didn’t speak a word of French. They had each other after all, and that’s all they needed. Within 4 months Pamela would awake to find Jim had passed away in the night. A piece of Pamela died that night as well, though she stuck around long enough to fight the legal battles to ensure Jim legacy and wishes not be forgotten. They would both be deceased by age 27, though their love story has filled our airwaves and libraries ever since. As Ray Manzarek said “Pamela and Jim are going to go down in the history books as great lovers and people are going to be writing plays about them. It’s Romeo & Juliet, it’s Heloise & Abelard, it’s Jim & Pam.”

There have been many books written about Jim which discuss Pamela, and there are many conflicting stories about their lives together. I had read many of these before but it wasn’t until reading Patricia Butler’s book Angels Dance & Angels Die that I felt Pamela got a fair representation.

Anyone who wishes to learn more about these gorgeous rock n roll lovers can head over to Muses & Stuff as we recently dedicated an episode to the pair.
Profile Image for Katie.
4 reviews1 follower
December 28, 2008
This book was given to me by my best friend who is now among the angels. By far one of my favorites.
Profile Image for J..
148 reviews4 followers
March 17, 2014
Many years ago I was a long haired musician wandering Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, California. Jim Morrison had been dead for a decade and Ms. Courson for almost as long. I had liked The Doors music, but I was far too young when Morrison's problems were in the News to be aware of them. I remembered that he died around the time that Jimi Hendrix. During my flirtation with Rock in the youth driven Hollywood of the 1980's, the band I was with became the house band at Gazzarri's on the Strip for awhile and during that time I got to know the late Bill Gazzarri pretty well and he knew Jim Morrison and Pamela Courson (Bill still had a pair of shoes behind the bar that he made Jim wear when he cruised the Blvd).

Over the years since I have read some of the biographies on Morrison. None of the books seemed to speak of the people that Bill, or others I met in Hollywood, remembered. Everyone of these biographies seemed to have an ax to grind about these two hippies. First off, Jim Morrison was a drinker, not a stoner. Pamela was actually pretty well liked outside the nastiness of the other Doors and their hanger ons. That is the point though is it not, history is usually told by it's survivors and the remaining Doors were a pretty pathetic group of garage band types who only had a chance at fame because of Morrison. When he was gone, their time was over.

Butler took six years to research her book and she takes a different view of the two. She paints the picture of Morrison that was more familiar to those I had spoken to on the strip. Jim was a man caught between the Beat poets and the psychedelic rockers of the 1960's. He was bridging the gap between two groups and might have been more in line with Jack Kerouac partying on Sunset, than the other West Coast Rockers he was associated with. No wonder why he was a loner, who separated the different groups he befriended. Pamela was really a loner too, and somehow they were able to ignite each other's passion. Perhaps, it is because in many ways they were both out of place on Sunset Blvd...I have seen that before too. I can forgive Patricia Butler for falling in love with Pamela by the end of her book, I fell in love with her too and maybe it is not a bad thing to try and understand that Courson, like everyone else had her good days and bad, but like The Doors she lost her shinning star on that hot day in Paris and lost her way. If you want to continue to hate her, that is your choice. You are not hurting her anymore, but read the book with an open mind and see what you feel at the conclusion of the story.

Butler interviews many of the people who knew them that were not just work associates. It is nice to see that time had also passed and some of the other Doors had better things to say, now that they were facing their own mortality. In the end there was nothing supernatural about their lives, they were on a collision course with death, as their whole generation was. They had passion, they had adventure and I cannot help but envy their innocence. By the time it was my time, my age group was already jaded in our twenties. The fifties exploded into the sixties and then dribbled into the seventies and eighties. I have only had a little view of that time through a glass darkly, but Ms Butler's book widened that view somewhat not only on the subject intended, but on the place that for a decade I called home and for that I am indebted to her.

I highly recommend the book for anyone who is intrigued by Morrison or interested in that particular time in either Hollywood or the music industry.
Profile Image for Holly Gollnick Cotta.
54 reviews1 follower
June 4, 2012
I live near where she grew up so I got better stories from my chemistry teacher but this book is still really good!
Profile Image for Liz Minette.
16 reviews1 follower
June 15, 2012
One of the best books I've read so far about the Doors. It gave Jim and Pam more depth to their personalities I thought rather than some of the one-dimensional stuff I've read and seen. I thought it was well-researched
Profile Image for Krista.
73 reviews2 followers
May 31, 2012
For all my morbidness, I love love and what Jim and Pam had was the real deal, no matter how screwed up it usually was. I loved how he reffered to Pam as his "cosmic mate". *swoon* :)
Profile Image for Kashmir White.
20 reviews4 followers
June 22, 2012
This book looks sugary on the outside, but the author certainly did her research. She is a main source for many of the better-known Morrison biographies. Essential Doors reading.
53 reviews3 followers
April 21, 2008
If you are a Jim Morrison fan then this book is great. There's a lot more info on Pam in this book then all of the others I've ever read.
Profile Image for Leslie.
354 reviews15 followers
March 1, 2009
I enjoyed this book because it is the first one I've read about The Doors that gave me any kind of comprehensive picture of who Pamela Courson was. This is a joint biography--it tells about each person's childhood, their life together, Jim's death, Pamela's life after Jim died and about Pamela's death three years later.
I found it very interesting that the author rejects the alternate theories of how Jim died, to the point that she does not even elaborate on what they are. She just states that Jim died of respiratory problems--which was always the official version, but never one that many people believed was true. She alludes to the fact that there are many different stories as to how he died, but doesn't go into any detail. She seems to downplay the drug addictions of both Pamela and Jim. I wonder which version is more accurate.
Butler calls Pamela Pamela Morrison, even though they were never legally married. Pam called herself that, too. The couple took out several marriage licenses, but never had a wedding. She was considered his common law wife because of the amount of years they lived together.
I like how Butler tries to put the events that happened into context. Pam and Jim were so young, they lived such short lives. They lived in the 60's, not this decade. I think that's an important distinction to make.
Butler quotes John Densmore's ex-wife several times, even though she comes across as a person with an agenda. That was one thing I didn't like.
I'm glad I finally read this book. I learned a lot and got a different perspective of Pamela and Jim.
Profile Image for Nina.
Author 13 books83 followers
September 3, 2008
On first read I was disappointed that Pam was portrayed in the context of her relationship with Jim, but after re-reading and much thought, I realize that this is the only way we can attempt to know Pamela Courson. The 60s was the beginning of the feminist movement; in that era, band chicks were seen as an adjunct to the rock star. Agents and managers often encouraged the male stars to keep their significant relationships secret. Many women kept their personal aspirations hidden and basked in the reflected glory of their partner. Despite the tumult of her final years, Pam fought to be her own person and live life on her terms.

The romance of Pam and Jim wasn't what was tragic; the real tragedy was the excess which cut short their lives. Butler's book is a nice addition to a collection of Doors biographies.
3 reviews
September 21, 2012
It has been several years ago that I finished this book. I was in my early 20's and I was thirsty for love stories. It was even better for me that it involved Jim Morrison, who I was a big fan of, I received much pleasure from this book. There are times when I'm all by myself and I can recall lines from the pages.
Profile Image for Gato Negro.
1,210 reviews2 followers
January 14, 2016
Love Jim. Love Pam. They were definitely 'Romeo and Juliet' for the summer of love crowd. Their relationship, though undeniably torrid, was utterly romantic. Soulmates, indeed. The book does a great job of giving the reader a bird's eye of their relationship and provides little details about things even a die hard Doors fan might not know. Interesting.
61 reviews2 followers
April 6, 2015
True love story

I'm glad a personal book on the relationship of Pam and Jim was published because it made them more human. It shows they weren't just the typical rock God and groupie but soul mates that lead an ordinary life with extraordinary circumstances.
Profile Image for Jennifer.
66 reviews1 follower
August 3, 2011
This one is my favorite rock biographies, and may be my favorite book of all time. It's a rock bio, a mystery, and a love story all in one.
Profile Image for Briánna.
130 reviews1 follower
September 5, 2011
I loved this one!!! You get a deeper look into Jim & Pams volatile relationship.
Profile Image for Cerise.
1 review
December 12, 2011
this book was sad and so exciting to read I read it in one day
Profile Image for Bren fall in love with the sea..
1,959 reviews477 followers
April 18, 2019
Skimmed.

Honestly? It was boring. I did not really get much out of this one. I eventually misplaced the book before I could finish but was only skimming anyway. It did not hold my attention and alot of it was just about Jim and Pamela and her spending habits and it did not tell me anything new.

It was OK. (What I read of it.) But not great.
2 reviews
March 26, 2012
One of the best Books I have yet to read about them both !! Very real and not fake like Patricia Kennealy's Book !! Loved it !!
Profile Image for Rebecca Bunfill.
12 reviews2 followers
April 10, 2020
This book was an easy read! I didn’t expect it to be so easy and such a pager turner at that. Very good book! Learned a lot I didn’t know, things that were funny, sad, disturbing and shocking. The one thing I didn’t understand is why there wasn’t more stories of just Jim and Pamela because when you read the title you are thinking it’s gonna be mainly based on that. There was a lot on him and The Doors (information I knew and some I didn’t) you learn some of Pamela’s background and get some insight on her as a person. I have a lot of mixed feelings towards her and the relationship that she and Jim had. Some stories made me really mad some made me really sad and others made me laugh. Some things I’m not sure how accurate they are given the sources but there is some things that are controversial for sure and some things you have heard before maybe more in depth and maybe not so depending on the subject you will get with one of those. No matter how many books you read about Jim, The Doors or Jim and Pam it will always make for a good conversation and there is always something you can add to. The scenarios you could go go over a thousand times and still have questions and curiosities about. It’s a fascinating and entertaining topic that I so far don’t get tired of hearing and going over. I recommend this book!
Profile Image for Kristine (fezabel).
108 reviews76 followers
October 18, 2008
People believe what they want to believe. And the author of this book, Ms. Patricia Butler, must desperately want to believe that Pamela Courson was a decent person and really loved Jim Morrison. She didn't love him - she only used him for money and security. On July 3, 1971, she watched as Jim died from her addiction. She was never married to him (common law or otherwise). They only had a marriage license application that was never filled out or turned in. Ms. Butler has no right to call her "Mrs. Morrison". But, when the people you write about are dead, you can do whatever you want, right? This book is very badly written and it has no literary value at all.

Go read Patricia Kennealy-Morrison's book Strange Days for a real look at Jim Morrison and the woman he called wife. You'll be very glad you did.

Profile Image for Nancy.
332 reviews3 followers
July 9, 2011
I have read many books on the Doors and Jim Morrison from many perspectives. I liked this book because I never read anything about his friends from childhood or their thoughts and experiences about/with him. This book also has many more details about Jim's day-to-day life unlike any others I have read. Reading about Pam also felt like I was getting much more insight into what made Jim who he was. I couldn't put this one down.
Profile Image for Cristiane Höller.
8 reviews1 follower
November 19, 2013
I liked the book although it does not bring much detailed info on Pamela. What i mean is, i finished the book and still don't have a very good idea of who she was, what kind of person she really was. But assuming that it's very hard to get information on Pam, it was quite good to read some accounts of people who knew her and Jim. Still, i thougt the book a little confuse. The pictures are wonderful though.
Profile Image for Carol Storm.
Author 28 books238 followers
March 29, 2011
Touching and tragic -- goes far beyond the hero worship of NO ON HERE GETS OUT ALIVE!

Profile Image for Kay.
261 reviews
July 3, 2013
Their relationship was both tumultuous and romantic for a brief reality.
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