Can you forgive her? Can you do that? There was no response. Because if you can start to forgive, then it will become easier. And? And then you will be able to forgive yourself—and ask others to forgive you.

— Alexander McCall Smith

…did it make a difference if the remark never got back to the person about whom it was made? She thought not. The harm is done when the words are uttered: that is the act of belittlement, the act of diminishing the other, and it is that act which would cause pain to the victim. You said that about me? The wrong was located in the making of the cruel remark, rather than in the pain it might later cause.

— Alexander McCall Smith

Human history seems to me to be one long story of people sweeping down—or up, I suppose—replacing other people in the process.

— Alexander McCall Smith

I shall go and sit under a tree…. Which tree, MMA?... Oh, there are many trees in this life, she said. It does not matter which tree you choose, as long as you choose the right one.

— Alexander McCall Smith

It shall be an offense for any man, either a husband or other person of the male sex, married or otherwise, being over the age of twelve years, to throw any item of clothing having been worn by the said person for whatever length of time, upon the floor of any bathroom or any room adjacent to and connected to a bathroom, without good cause.

— Alexander McCall Smith

It was a voice that you felt you had to listen to—or you ignored at your peril.

— Alexander McCall Smith

Men, she thought, were odd about their clothes: they liked to wear the same things until they became defeated and threadbare.

— Alexander McCall Smith

…one of those dreadful boarding schools. It was down on the South Coast. I think some very unpleasant things happened there…. So many lives were distorted by such cruelty. I know so many men who had to put up with that, so many….

— Alexander McCall Smith

People don’t talk about mercy very much these days—it has a rather old-fashioned ring to it. But it exists and its power is quite extraordinary

— Alexander McCall Smith

She had always understood that love could have an intense physical effect; could fill a space somewhere in the chest, could turn knees weak, could raise the pulse; could intoxicate, just as could a strong martini or a glass of champagne. Could, she thought, and would…but only if you allowed it, only if you opened whatever portals of the heart needed to be opened. And some people, of course, found it difficult to do that.

— Alexander McCall Smith