Quote

Self-pity does not appreciate pedantry.

Alexander McCall Smith

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Alexander McCall Smith
Age: 76
Born: 1948
Born: August 24
Novelist
Teacher
Writer
Alexander Sandy McCall Smith
Pedantry
Pity
Appreciate
Doe
Self

More quotes by Alexander McCall Smith

Image
When you allow people to do what they wish, then that is what they do. They stop doing the things they need to do.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
We think the world is ours forever, but we are little more than squatters.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
I have three older sisters, so we were a reasonably large family and, in general, a happy one.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
She was made for untidy rooms and rumpled beds.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
It's a different sort of love taht puts up with illness. Old love.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
A very powerful theme in fiction is that of loss.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
If you lose sight of the smaller accomplishments , you end up with an imbalance in your life.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
Dating is really all about sex. In the conventional context, this means that the man invites the woman to go through a social encounter, the ultimate purpose of which is sexual engagement.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
I cannot see myself in a new car. I am a tiny white van person. That is what i want!
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
To lose a child ... was something that could end one's world. One could never get back to how it was before. The stars went out. The moon disappeared. The birds became silent.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
My parents were very supportive and always encouraged us. My father was a gentle, nice man. My mother was quite a colourful character and a keen reader who encouraged me to write.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
I am capable of being idle.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
We all know that it is women who take the decisions, but we have to let men think that the decisions are theirs. It is an act of kindness on the part of women.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
Lou knew that joy unshared was a halved emotion, just as sadness and loss, when borne alone, were often doubled.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
There are old mycologists and there are bold mycologists, but there are no old, bold mycologists.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
Daughters could survive a powerful mother, but boys found it almost impossible. Such boys were often severely damaged and spent the rest of their lives running away from their mothers, or from anybody who remotely reminded them of their mothers either that, or they became their mothers, in a desperate, misguided act of psychological self defence.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
I think that we've made great moral progress in the second half of the 20th century in many respects, and particularly in relation to human rights but I think that we are losing sight of some of the values of concern for others, and self-respect and respect for others.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
It would be wonderful to have a guru it would be like having a social worker or a personal trainer, not that people who had either of these necessarily appreciated the advice they received.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
We don't forget.... 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 came back, unexpectedly, to remind us who we are.
Alexander McCall Smith
Image
I enjoy women's conversation, and I think that helps me to describe them in fiction.
Alexander McCall Smith