When I get through tearing a lobster apart, or one of those tender West Coast octopuses, I feel like I had a drink from the fountain of youth.

- Joseph Mitchell

I never felt at home. I stuck outIn New York City, especially in Greenwich Village, down among the cranks and the misfits and the one-lungers and the…

- Joseph Mitchell

The best talk is artless, the talk of people trying to reassure or comfort themselves, women in the sun, grouped around baby carriages, talking about…

- Joseph Mitchell

...you can hate a place with all your heart and soul and still be homesick for it.

- Joseph Mitchell

I have a great deal of experience in justifying myself to myself.

- Joseph Mitchell

Life is a goddam mess...but you wouldn't want to miss it!

- Joseph Mitchell

He had a habit of remarking to bartenders that he didn't see any sense in mixing whiskey with water since the whiskey was already wet.

- Joseph Mitchell

Also, I had not yet found out about time; I was still under the illusion that I had plenty of time - time for this, time for that, time for everythin…

- Joseph Mitchell

All information of a spiritual or personal nature will have to come from our father, who art in heaven, and I think he's in New York right now.

- Joseph Mitchell