Quotes from Alexander McCall Smith

It was Lennie Marchbanks at the door. She had met him once or twice before and rather liked him; mechanics struck her as being such easy, agreeable people. And, she noticed, as a psychotherapist, one never had a mechanic for a patient. Why was that? Were they invariably balanced people, free of the neuroses that afflicted non-mechanically-minded others?

And then," continued the clerk, "they send those students out at the end of their course and say, 'Go off and use those big words and long sentences to get all the good, high-paying jobs. And once you're in those jobs, always remember to use long sentences to protect your position. If you use long sentences, nobody will dare remove you. That is an important rule that we have worked out.' That is what they say, Mma—I have heard it on very good authority.

And so he thinks he's entitled–or almost entitled–to call himself the Duke of Johannesburg," James continued. "Secretly, though, he's worried that the Lord Lyon and his people will catch him. He saw the Lord Lyon the other day in the supermarket in Morningside and he almost fainted. I was with him at the time. It was in the frozen products section and he had to stick his head into one of those big refrigerated displays so as not to be recognised.

substitute for those friendships of childhood that survive into adult years. Those are the ones in which we are bound to one

We should not be too surprised by the kindness of strangers, as it is always there.

It's so difficult to sustain a fatwa,' said Domenica. 'One has to be so enthusiastic. I'm not sure if I could find the moral energy myself.

It is so easy to thank people, said Mma Ramotswe, passing the letter over to Mma Makutsi, and most people don't bother to do it. They don't thank the person who does something for them. They just take it for granted.

acknowledge the unexpected exchange of fellow feeling between

Perhaps there was no real point to our existence–or none that we could discern–and that meant that the real question that had to be asked was this: How can I make my life bearable? We are here whether we like it or not, and by and large we seem to have a need to continue. In that case, the real question to be addressed is: How are we going to make the experience of being here as fulfilling, as good as possible? That

He came over the border at night, as he had no papers. It is not easy, Mma, to have no papers. If you are a person without papers, then you are nothing. Even cattle have papers these days, Mma—I'm joking, of course, but that is what it can feel like to have no papers.

something just because everybody

A new master's course was being offered in community relations. He read the short paragraph extolling the usefulness and topicality of this course. He wondered whether it would help, or whether it was no more than an aspiration—a course in what might be, but wasn't. But at least they were trying; at least they were not instituting a new master's programme in cynicism and indifference.

It defeated him that anybody could ever bring such a result about if they knew, or could imagine, the heartbreak of the victim's family. Of course the people who did these things were usually deficient in moral imagination—they could not see what it would be like because they simply lacked the capacity to do so.

They meet these women who hang about in bars waiting for other women's husbands. This city is full of women like that." She looked at Alice, and there flowed between them a brief current of understanding. All women in Botswana were the victims of the fecklessness of men.

He looked again at Angel. Her blonde hair, shoulder length, had been tied back with a red ribbon. A red ribbon stood for carnality—of course it did. And her blouse was tight—deliberately so. You don't wear clothes that are tight unless you want to get out of them at the first opportunity—everybody knew that. And her jeans were close-fitting, and even her shoes looked several sizes too small for the feet that were within.

you want to be charitable, then I think you should start at home—right under your nose—and give Charlie more money, rather than help this distant cousin—so distant that we'd need binoculars to see him, Mma.

it,' he said. 'People change their

Morality is for everyone and that is what

there was any number of men like that, waiting for an attractive girl that they could latch on to and whose life they could slowly destroy.

Yet she was determined that when she married she would not forget who she was and who her people were. She would not affect any airs.

Mushroom people are fond of saying, 'There are old mycologists and there are bold mycologists, but there are no old, bold mycologists.' 

One day Felix came to me and complained that somebody had whipped him very badly. He took off his shirt and I saw the skin covered with wheals. I asked him who had done this and he replied that it had been the supervisor at a local mission. I drove with Felix to make a complaint to the missionary, who interrogated his supervisor. The supervisor admitted that he had whipped Felix, but said that this was because Felix had gone round the mission station biting his enemies.

We all have Proustian moments, but don't really know about it until we read Proust.

You know something?" he said to Jamie. "I've never believed in God, but I do believe in his love.