What an interesting discussion! You have both made some very good points. On the subject of Morrissey's personality, I have to say I am closer to Worm's view. You can't attribute Morrissey's mercurial behaviour, sometimes unpredictable decisions, etc. only to his inexperience. He seems to be the kind of person who needs to have complete control over every aspect of his career. This is confirmed by many people who have worked with/for him in different stages of his career, some have even called him "unmanageable. Besides, he isn't a very trusting person, and things that have happened in the past - such as Johnny's departure from The Smiths, the court case, the bad press he got... - must have made him even more suspicious that people would betray him. You can't ignore the fact that he has always had problems with communicating with people, and has a habit of using other people to enforce his decisions - a trait which some people mistake for arrogance. The impression from all the biographies and articles I have read is that Morrissey is a very complicated and difficult man, and that he's had all those character traits since his adolescence. His complex and tortured personality (I feel stupid writing these words, since they already sound like a cliche when applied to him - but they are true) is what made him a great lyricist and an iconic figure, but it's also what makes him so, as many people have said, 'difficult to work with'.
On the other hand, I agree with Danny that Morrissey's bad traits and his share of blame for the split of The Smiths have been exaggerated by the media, and that Johnny Marr is always left off the hook too easily just because he's a 'nice, normal bloke' who never says any controversial things. I can understand why Morrissey himself has made a couple of remarks such as (speaking about the EMI contract) "Johnny was left off the hook... as he always is" or (about the court case) "Johnny, trying to please everybody and ending up pleasing nobody".
The story about the NME article is a good example - NME have made it clear that Morrissey was
not the source of that rumour. There is a further explanation in "The Severed Alliance" about Danny Kelly's actual sources (he heard some rumours, couldn't get anything from Rough Trade, and asked NME's Manchester correspondent Dave Haslam for confirmation; that's all). But it seems that Johnny
thought at the time that Morrissey was behind this, and assumed that it was Morrissey's way of kicking him out of the band (His words were "I'm sure it would do him a lot of good".) NME have admitted that they were partly to blame for the split. But it seems like Morrissey is not the only one who can be paranoid! It often seems to me that he and Marr have a lot more in common than people think.
The Cilla Black story was quite silly - I always thought it was just an excuse. But Marr has since given a lot better explanation of his reasons for leaving - that he just felt it was all too much of a strain for him and that he couldn't take it anymore.
There's one thing I don't agree with you on, Worm: I don't think that Johnny was the more ambitious of the two.
BTW, did Morrissey ever really watch "Cagney & Lacey"?