Quotes from Alexander McCall Smith

It was pure privilege that determined where so many of us ended up in life, Isabel reflected; it was nothing to do with merit, it was privilege. Or, putting it another way, it was a matter of accident, or luck.

every man has a map in his heart of his own country and that the heart will never allow you to forget this map.

People's lives are delicate; you cannot interfere with them without running the risk of changing them profoundly. A chance remark, a careless involvement, may make the difference between a life of happiness and one of sorrow.

when people ask for advice they very rarely want your advice and will go ahead and do what they want to do anyway, no matter what you say.

You had to look after other people because if you did not, then the world was a cold and lonely place, a place where, if you stumbled, there would be no hand to pull you to your feet.

The world was a lonely place, a place of transience, of change, of loss; only the bonds, the ties of friendship and family protect us from the loneliness

Annabelle finished the explanation. "It's just that they take some time to happen. That's the difference.

Eddie let out a whistle. "You really got rid of that old bag." "Please don't call her that." "But that's what she is," said Eddie. "She complained to me about the Parmesan the other day. She more or less accused me of substituting grana. She's a real pain. Big-time.

To dispatch one's friends to a dictionary from time to time is one of the more sophisticated pleasures of life, but it is one that must be indulged in sparingly: to do it too often may result in accusations of having swallowed one's own dictionary, which is not a compliment whichever way one looks at it.

people are very slow to say sorry. I

And as far as fourteen-year-old boys were concerned, she had yet to meet one who was not, at least in some respects, embarrassing or difficult. That, simply, was what fourteen-year-old boys were like.

One could never read enough. Never.

Giving gave every bit as much pleasure as receiving—if not more, and denying that pleasure to others could be churlish.

Martha simply did not know that virtually everything she said was inappropriate, and so there was no point in remonstrating with her.

She's an expert on the subjunctive, as I think you may know.' This brought a sharp reaction from Unterholzer. He was the expert on the subjunctive, and it was intolerable that von Igelfeld should go around picking up–for that was what it amounted to–unauthorised experts on the subjunctive, just because they expressed a–misguided–enthusiasm for his work.

And then there was the delicate issue of what to do with one's bottom while one was walking. Some people thought that one could just leave one's bottom to follow one when one was walking. Not so. A mere glance at any glamorous girl would show that the bottom had to be more involved.

At some stage, of course, you're going to discover that good does not always triumph and that evil can very easily win the battle; I hope, though, that when that truth dawns you will be old enough and strong enough to make the deliberate effort not to believe it. Because only if we pretend that it is not true can we steel ourselves to fight against it—like those young men in the Spitfires who did not stop to consider the impossible, daunting odds and went up nonetheless.

Now, as he finished the last of his porridge, Mr. J.L.B. Matekoni reminded himself that the one thing he felt certain about when it came to women was that you could never be sure.

There was always something going on in the background—some plotting or mulling over some slight or lack of attention, quite unintended, of course, but noted and filed away for subsequent scrutiny. And much of the time men would be unaware of it, until it all came out in a torrent of recrimination and tears.

Most of us are quite selfish when it comes to our children, you know. We want things from them: love, the satisfaction of seeing them do well, and so on. Plenty of parents don't think just of their child's best interest. Oh, they may pay lip service to it, but they really think of themselves, of what they get from parenting.

That's a bit of philosophy right there. We all want ice cream in this life. That's what we want. And that tells us an awful lot about human nature and the way we feel—which is what philosophy is all about, I would have thought.

It had given her pleasure to do things for him in his lifetime, and now it was a pleasure to do things for his memory. But the memory of a father went only so far.

Our heads may be small, but they are as full of memories as the sky may sometimes be full of swarming bees, thousands and thousands of memories, of smells, of places, of little things that happened to us and which come back, unexpectedly, to remind us who we are.

It would be good if there could be an end to need in this world; it would be good if people did not have to worry about what would happen to them if their crops failed, or if their cattle got sick and died, or if they lost the jobs on which they, along with a number of hungry mouths, depended.