"I was there, I did it, I could have changed and left, but I had made my choice. The glimmer of glory was there. I couldn't resist it. My self-esteem was hurt. I was looking for a way out." Mark Chapman was clear in his testimony. In 2004, 24 years after the murder of John Lennon, he confessed completely cynically, that everything was pre-planned. "I had thought about it very well, I had been preparing it for a long time. Three months before the murder, I had visited the building where his apartment was located in Dakota, to check the place. I was so determined to commit the crime".
On December 8, 1980, Chapman would meet Lennon in the morning, initially to ask for his autograph. In his hands he held a copy of Double Fantasy, John's seventh and final record, on the cover of which he asked him to sign. It was a "full" day for Lennon. Shortly before the "visit" of his killer, he had been photographed together with Yoko for Rolling Stone magazine and had given another interview of the dozens he gave in his life.
In the evening of the same day, Chapman would implement his plan, to "feed" his own ego. A few minutes after 23.00 at night, while the former "Beetle" was returning to his home, in the historic Dakota building in New York, together with his wife, and having recorded "Walking on Thin Ice" and "It Happened" , Mark Chapman would murder him by shooting him in the back four times.
Lennon found the strength before collapsing to take six steps and enter the building's entrance. Doorman Jose Perdomo managed to wrestle the gun from Chapman. Lennon was immediately taken to Roosevelt Hospital, but he had already died 15 minutes after the shooting.
According to witness and police reports, after the murder, Chapman remained calm at the crime scene until police arrived. He also had in his possession the copy of the Double Fantasy record, on the cover of which Lennon had earlier signed, a copy of the novel "The Catcher in the Rye" by TN Salinger, as well as tapes of Beatles songs. He kept the same from the morning of that day until the end of it.
Less than 24 hours after the attack that shocked the planet, on January 22, 1981, Rolling Stone magazine would publish the legendary photo of Annie Leibovitz from that fateful day. The photo depicts John Lennon, naked, in the fetal position next to his wife Yoko Ono, and the cover in question was voted the best of the 40th year by the American Association of Magazine Directors (ASME) in 2005.
For the record, Chapman apologized for the killing at his 11th hearing a few months ago in September 2020, after yet another request to have his prison sentence suspended.
During his most recent hearing, Chapman stated that the 40-year-old musician's murder was solely for his own personal "glory", adding that for this act, he deserves the death penalty.
"I murdered him... because he was very, very, very famous and that's the only reason I was looking so, very, very much for personal glory," he said, describing his act as "too selfish." "He was too famous. I didn't kill him because of his character. He was an icon. He was someone who talked about things that went down in history, and he's brilliant."
For the legendary Polaroid photo , Leibovitz said John had said to her, showing him the frame of the fetal position next to the woman he called "his mother," "That's it. That's the exact position that describes our relationship." Ono insisted on staying in her clothes, while Lennon didn't hesitate to strip once more in front of the camera. He had also done it for Two Virgins, after all. When editor Jann Wenner saw the photo, he decided it would be the one that would accompany the two's last "joint appearance", in an issue that would sell 1.45 million copies and is a real memorial for Beatles fans.
What they really want, are dead heroes
In his last interview for Rolling Stone (December 5, 1980) , Lennon spoke to Jonathan Cote, who was a huge fan of his. The interview remained unpublished until 2011, 31 years after the murder, as the journalist could not emotionally handle transcribing it. That issue, dated January 22, '81, was all about the dead superstar, with extensive articles and artist statements, with Yoko herself talking about him, with a statement from their son, but no interview. Wenner wrote that the murder killed a part of his youth. That issue was his magnum opus.
In the interview, John talked about his abstinence from music and the fact that he had focused on having a child with his partner, after multiple failed attempts. In one excerpt, the star, frustrated by the media of his time, said:"What do they expect from me and Yoko anymore? To make love and then immediately kill ourselves? I understood for the first time that there is a kind of system where everyone becomes part of the big wheel and it just has to keep turning no matter what." At the same time he described how the same voracious system would "swallow" Bruce Springsteen who was then making his own breakthrough. Springsteen, of course, later chose never to become the "number one" rock star of his time, keeping space for himself and his choices.
"I'm interested in externalizing my thoughts and feelings, and music is a way to do that. Who am I supposed to be? Some kind of martyr who can't be rich?"
"Some people like to root for someone on their way to the top, but when they get there, they hate them. What they really want are dead heroes like Sid Vicious and James Dean. Well, I'm not interested in being that, forget it this".
Elsewhere in the interview, Lennon described how Yoko taught him to accept his sensitive side. His "feminine nature", as he characteristically described it.
"I am often afraid, but now I am not afraid to be afraid. The most painful thing is trying not to be yourself. People spend time trying to be something else, and this leads to tragic diseases. Many "tough men" die of cancer. John Wayne, Steve McQueen. I think it has to do with trying to live constantly trapped in an image or an illusion of what you are, suppressing a part of yourself that is your feminine side."
Talking about his past he remembered wanting to look like Marlon Brando or Elvis Presley. "I wanted to look tough like James Dean. I fought a lot inside myself to stop it. I still think like that when I feel insecure. Yoko taught me to think differently, a woman had to show me. Now I look at old pictures of myself, then that I was torn between being a Marlon Brando or a sensitive poet like Oscar Wilde. I was always between those two realities, but I had a tendency toward my chubby side, because if you showed your sensitive side, you were dead."
Finally, it is worth noting that Lennon had given an interview for the first issue of Rolling Stone that was released on November 9, 1967. In the same issue, he posed on the cover of the new magazine at the time, on the occasion of the release of the movie "How I Won the War" by Richard Lester.
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