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The proper handling for the cookie file paths are actually kinda complicated since it can contain escape characters ("Controllers MUST handle escape sequences inside this string." [1]). Functionally this means that its been processed by tor's "esc_for_log" function in 'common/util.c'.

TorCtl not only doesn't unescape paths, but also chokes if there's an escaped quote within it. For instance...

atagar@morrigan:~/Desktop/arm/src$ cat ~/.tor/torrc 
SocksPort 0
ControlPort 9051
CookieAuthentication 1

DataDirectory /tmp/my data"dir/

atagar@morrigan:~/Desktop/arm/src$ python
>>> from TorCtl import TorCtl
>>> conn = TorCtl.connect()
INFO[Sat Oct 29 10:46:55 2011]:Event loop received close message.
INFO[Sat Oct 29 10:46:55 2011]:Event loop received close message.
NOTICE[Sat Oct 29 10:46:55 2011]:Tor closed control connection. Exiting event thread.
NOTICE[Sat Oct 29 10:46:55 2011]:Tor closed control connection. Exiting event thread.
Failed to read authentication cookie (file doesn't exist): /tmp/my data\

For stem's handling of this see the 'CONTROL_ESCAPES' uses in: https://gitweb.torproject.org/stem.git/blob/HEAD:/stem/types.py#l39

Cheers! -Damian

[1] https://gitweb.torproject.org/torspec.git/blob/HEAD:/control-spec.txt#l960