Fifty Great Truths From The Pessimist’s Handbook
Seeing the black side of everything is also funny. This is how Eric Marcus, the author of the Pessimist’s Handbook, understood it. Definitely his work manages to get more laughter than tears, although it explores the darkest facet of reality.
Oddly enough, Eric Marcus is a real estate developer. He had a grandmother who was satisfied to see the black face of life. That inspired him to write about the worst of all, with fine humor. The book compiles phrases of great thinkers and others created and recreated by Marcus himself.
The flap of the book contains this phrase: “Are you tired of smiling faces? Tired of being told, ‘Don’t worry, be happy’? Feel like yelling at him ‘Be realistic!’ the next person to tell you to be optimistic? You are not alone!” And these are fifty of the great truths that the manual contains:
1-What can you expect from a day that begins with having to get up? (Wendy R. Ellner)
2-The only time a woman is successful in changing a man is when he is a baby. (Natalie Wood)
3-There is nothing wrong with adolescents that reasoning with them does not aggravate it. (Several)
4-Keep your eyes wide open before you get married and half closed afterwards. (Several)
5-The only way to stay healthy is to eat what you do not feel like, drink what you do not want, and do what you would rather not do. (Mark Twain)
6-The only normal people are those that one does not know well. (Joe Ancis)
7-Stop worrying about your health. It will go away (Robert Orben)
8-Experience is something wonderful: it allows us to recognize an error every time we repeat it.
9-After a year of therapy, my psychiatrist told me: “Maybe life is not for everyone …” (Larry Brown)
10-The fact that you are paranoid does not mean that they are not looking for you.
11-A pessimist is an experienced optimist. (Don Marquis)
12-It doesn’t matter what you decide to do; you are most likely wrong. (Ashleigh Brilliant)
13-I always expect the worst and it always turns out worse than I expected. (Henry James)
14-Life is much easier than you think; It is only necessary to accept the impossible, go through without the essential and endure the intolerable. (Kathlenn Norris)
15-Why do you torture yourself if life will take care of torturing you? (Laura Walker)
16-No good deed is free from punishment. (Clare Boothe Luce)
17-Life is not one curse after another; It is the same curse that is repeated and repeated. (Edna St Vincent)
18-Blessed is he who expects nothing because he will not suffer any disappointment. (Alexander Pope)
19-Before getting worse, things get much worse. (Lily Tomlin)
20-Life is a tough business from which no one leaves alive. (Herbert Frankel)
21-It is a sin to believe that others are bad, but it is rarely a mistake. (HL Mencken)
22-When you try to make a good impression on someone, you will surely do something stupid. (Tamara Valjean)
23-The difference between genius and stupidity is that genius has its limits. (Unknown author)
24-Whenever you want to marry someone, go to lunch with his ex-wife. (Shelley Winters)
25-When a man brings flowers to his wife for no reason, it is because there is a reason. (Molly McGee)
26-There is so little difference between husbands, that they may well stay with the first. (Adela Rogers St. Johns)
27-Aging is better than the alternative. (Several)
28-The longer you live, the less future you have to worry about. (Ashleigh Brillant)
29-The problem with some women is that they get excited about anything and then marry it (Cher)
30-Success is the ability to go from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm. (Winston Churchill)
31-When we finally achieve it, we can no longer bear it. (Malcolm Forbes)
32-There are two tragedies in life: the one is not achieving what you want. The other is to achieve it. (George Bernard Shaw)
33-One begins to feel young at 60, but it is too late. (Pablo Picasso).-
34-The first half of our lives are ruined by our parents and the second half, by our children. (Clarence Darrow)
35-Correct me if I’m wrong, but the fine line between madness and sanity Hasn’t it gotten thinner?
36-It begins with a prince who kisses an angel, and ends with a bald man who looks at a fat woman who is on the other side of the table. (Anonymous)
37-Happiness is having a great family, loving, diligent, that cares for one and is united, but in another city. (George Burns)
38-Love is fire. But you can never know if it’s going to warm your heart or burn down your house. (Joan Crawford)
39-Have courage! It doesn’t matter what you decide to do; you are most likely wrong. (Ashleigh Brilliant)
40-The bread always falls on the side that has the butter. (English proverb)
41-There is no problem so small that it cannot be disproportionately inflated. (Stuart Hughes)
42-You marry or not, it will always weigh you down. (Paul Brown)
43-When a young woman marries, she exchanges the attentions of many men for the disinterest of one. (Helen Rowland)
44-It is better not to know how sausages are made or the laws. (Unknown)
45-Sometimes it seems a shame that Noah and all of his group did not lose the boat. (Mark Twain)
46-There is practically nothing in the world that another person cannot do a little worse and sell a little cheaper. (John Ruskin)
47-I have enough money for the rest of my life, unless I buy something. (Jackie Mason)
48-Every man is happy twice in life: when he has just met his first love and when he has just left his last love. (HL Mencken)
49-One hundred thousand Lemmings (Norwegian rodents, who are thrown to their deaths from a cliff following the leader when there is overcrowding) cannot be wrong. (Several)
50-There are only two infinite things: the universe and human stupidity; but I’m not sure about the first one. (Albert Einstein)
Images courtesy of Lauren Kolodny
