Quotes from Mason Cooley

As a child I was middle-aged and cautious compared to my impulsive father.

My taking a seat on the Council of the Fathers caused a desperate fluttering among my ghosts.

My father liked to moralize, and so do I. But he was in earnest, while I am embarrassed and pretend that I am merely being witty.

The bathroom scale knows nothing of extenuating circumstances.

At the end of every diet the path curves back toward the trough.

I have forgiven you. Nevertheless, begone!

Always late: thus I make you the prisoner of my freedom.

The great advantage of a new friend is that we have not yet found one another out.

Drunks do not have friends, but accomplices.

Laughing at our friends, we avenge the disappointment they have caused.

Nothing more cheerful than talking about our friends shortcomings.

Even boredom has its crises.

Taste refers to the past, imagination to the future.

At sixty, I would like to give my future back its vistas of uncertainty.

Love begins with an image; lust with a sensation.

The exhibitionist loves to flirt with shame

Opportunity knocks, but doesn't always answer to its name.

Reality is the name we give to our disappointments.

Irony regards every simple truth as a challenge.

For many, immaturity is an ideal, not a defect.

Love begins with an image; lust with a sensation.

Fastidious taste makes enjoyment a struggle.

The ugly can achieve an absoluteness beyond the reach of beauty.

Beauty is lyrical. Ugliness is elegiac.