Quotes from Alexander McCall Smith

Fiction is able to encompass books that are bleak and which dwell on the manifold and terrible problems of our times. But I don't think that all books need to have that particular focus.

We should be careful of the insults we fling at others, lest they return and land at our feet, newly minted to apply to those who had first coined them.

Well, Id say all of us are a combination of moods and emotions. In my day to day life I dont go around skipping, but at times one can feel sheer exhilarating joy at the world.

You do not have to ladle on the impasto to make a point about human frailty or ambitions.

A very powerful theme in fiction is that of loss.

That my philosophy of life is, as far as possible, one of enjoyment. I'm not nihilistic.

If you lose sight of the smaller accomplishments , you end up with an imbalance in your life.

Life consists of positive and negative features, and I think that it is permissible to write about both.

Simple questions--and simple answers--were what we needed in life. That was what Mma Ramotswe believed. Yes.

Who can't like pigs? They're wonderful creatures! I've always liked pigs.

New York is a wonderful place to be up, an awful place to be down.

With '44 Scotland Street' I found myself having to work out how a daily novel works, and it is completely different to a conventional novel.

Our minds can come up with the most entertaining possibilities, if we let them. But most of the time, we keep them under far too close a check.

I've certainly always had a very high regard for Botswana and so I paint a very good picture of the country and I've never pretended to be painting an entirely realistic picture.

The local community is very important in one's life; the feelings of identification with a place and people.

I am capable of being idle.

My parents were very supportive and always encouraged us. My father was a gentle, nice man. My mother was quite a colorful character and a keen reader who encouraged me to write.

As a writer I've learned certain lessons. One of them is to be careful about how you put a view, and to bear in mind how easily and readily you'll be misinterpreted.

Serial novels have an unexpected effect; they hook the writer as well as the reader.

But you cannot expect every writer to dwell on human suffering. I think my books do deal with grave issues. People who say they are too positive probably haven't read them.

Writers obviously have to bear witness to the harsh face of the age.

Writing fiction, I really just sit there and it just comes.

The Okavango Delta is an astonishing sight: the great Okavango River, rather than flow towards the sea, flows inland, into the sands of the Kalahari.

The point about love, the essential point, was that we loved what we loved. We did not choose. We just loved.