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b934b63
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There's a poem about onions," she said. "It's about how memory is like an onion--it makes you cry."
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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1e74b71
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It would be strange to live in a country where people were silent, passing one another in the street wordlessly, as if frightened of what the other might think or say. This was not the African way, where people would call out and converse with one another from opposite sides of a road, or across a wide expanse of bush, careless of who heard. Such conversations could be carried on by people walking in different directions, until voices grew ..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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4bbcc2f
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Minty's in a bit of trouble, and he was not surprised. He said something about her sailing too close to the wind.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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ae91430
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Had he sailed too close to the wind? No, in his case another meteorological metaphor was appropriate perhaps: he had reaped whirlwinds--or at least what he had sown. She looked at her watch.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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2b13bec
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Do not allow the profession of which you are a member to induce you to take a bleak view of humanity. You will encounter all sorts of bad behavior but do not judge everybody by the standards of the lowest. If you
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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0fd2507
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That is the problem with governments these days. They want to do things all the time; they are always very busy thinking of what things they can do next. That is not what people want.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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1903f19
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A life without moments of unhappiness would be monotonous, I would have thought.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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d50feef
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The trouble with having a conscience, she said to herself, is that it never sleeps.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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3d37fe1
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I'm glad you came," said Rob. "I like having lunch. I find it a much more sociable meal than dinner."
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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a4f6f19
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Children, like cats, made a house into a home, and the echoes of their presence lingered.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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82d4b7a
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You'd think he'd look more ashamed of himself," said Bertie. "You'd think that he'd look more ashamed of being a Campbell."
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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e949384
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Preserve' is an entirely suitable motto for a jam-making company," said one. "Marmalade and so on--I'm not so sure it's quite right for a firm of lawyers."
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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ec79f36
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The eyes are the window of the soul...it was such a well-worn adage, a cliche by now, but Isabel had read that neuroscience, which was validating so many intuitive, ancient beliefs about who we were and how we lived our lives, now confirmed this insight too. The part of the brain that was most closely associated with self-awareness, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, lay directly behind the eyes. So that was where we were located--that was..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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c13a47c
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Families come in different ways... sometimes they are given to you, but sometimes you find them yourself, unexpectedly, as you go through life.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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941404a
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The world was an imperfect place--as the events of the last few days had demonstrated--but within that vale of tears there were many sites and times of quietude and contentment, and this place and this moment on the veranda was one such.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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78b3667
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She said that too." His voice was low key and modest. The accent, which was not very pronounced, had the gentle burr of the Scottish professional classes. This was an accent that would score highly in those tests of reliability that newspapers liked to carry out--those surveys that tended to reveal that a mild Scottish accent in a bank manager or financial adviser inspired more public trust than any other voice. By the same token, although ..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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af3c411
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There were many people who were unhappy, and wanted to move. Often they wished to come to the more fortunate countries--such as Botswana--in order to make more of their lives. That was understandable, and yet there were those who did not want them. This is our place, they said; you are not welcome. It was so easy to think like that. People wanted to protect themselves from those they did not know. Others were different; they talked differen..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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5d3b324
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He had only recently learned the word dramaturge and had been looking for opportunities to use it. He had eventually summoned up the courage to try it on Big Lou, but her espresso machine had hissed at a crucial moment and she had not heard him.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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6e50222
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Offering a lady a chair was one way of showing that this work was appreciated, and that strength and brute force--at which men generally tended to excel--was not the only thing that counted. Respect for ladies tamed men, and there were many men who were sorely in need of taming; that was well known, said Mma Ramotswe.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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5098e26
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It is better to tell people good things, Mma--if you can.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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9e015e1
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Like so many women, her life seemed to be all about the needs of others. Auden had said something about that, she reminded herself--something witty. We are here on this earth to help others, but he had no idea why the others were here.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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408e3b6
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of being linked with each other, we have every temptation to be selfish and unmoved by others and by their plight. Our towns, our cities, our places become no more than hotels, with all that lack of intimacy that is a feature of hotels - strangers under one roof, no more. Well, we should not be strangers to one another. We
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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d9095d6
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She wanted everything back, as we do sometimes in our irrationality and regret; we want it all back.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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db1681d
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a prison of put-downs and belittlements.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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800742f
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But then she reminded herself that there were plenty of people who were afraid of the police, even if they had clear consciences. These were people who had been the victims of bullying when young--bullying by severe teachers, by stronger children; there were so many ways in which people could be crushed. Such people might feat the police in the same way in which they feared all authority.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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2d22bb6
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I think it is time that I put the kettle on,
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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1f3ba22
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we all have some things we are ashamed of.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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ce30b4a
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There were countless injustices and difficulties in this world, but small points of light too, where the darkness was held back.
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hope
injustice
light
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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66de74d
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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.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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2eb0a2a
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We assume so much, don't we? We assume that our children are going to be reasonable. We assume they're going to see things as we see them. And then suddenly we discover that they can look at things quite differently.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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bd8ecff
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We become the people we live with. Imperceptibly at first, but with a certain inevitability, we become the other.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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19c2f09
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love was a form of blindness that closed the eyes to the most glaring faults. You could love a murderer, and simply not believe that your lover would do so much as crush a tick, let alone kill somebody. There would be no point trying to dissuade her.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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e3598a7
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Her country had never been aggressive, had never espoused violence, had never taken sides in the squabbles of others. She wondered how people could sleep if they knew that somebody, in their name, was dropping bombs on other people or breaking into their homes and taking them away somewhere. Why did they do it? Why was it necessary to kill and maim other people when the other people would be just the same as yourself--people who wanted to l..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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010f9d5
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That is why the artist will always be happy--no matter how the world treats him. If he knows that what he creates is good, then he can bear the indifference of others.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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d94f4c3
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But emotions and detective work did not always mix; there was something about that in Clovis Andersen's The Principles of Private Detection. What had he said? Emotions have the same effect as a magnet has on a compass...Yes, that was it. The needle swings around in a confusing way and you lose direction.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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cddbd64
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Mma Ramotswe had been thinking a great deal recently about how people might be fitted in. The world was a large place, and one might have thought that there was enough room for everybody. But it seemed that this was not so. There were many people who were unhappy, and wanted to move. Often they wished to come to the more fortunate countries - such as Botswana - in order to make more of their lives. That was understandable, and yet there wer..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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f1bb414
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I'm very glad that Matthew phoned," he said. "I've been out of touch, you know. It's like that out here. You get caught up in your own life and you forget about family back home."
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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383f8aa
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She was thinking of Mobile, where her mother--her "sainted American mother," as she called her--had spent her childhood. That was a place of shady streets; of moss that hung from the boughs of trees, as if draped there for adornment by some enthusiastic exterior decorator; of sultry, velvet evenings. Things moved slowly in Mobile, as they did, traditionally, throughout the South. And why should they not? If you walked quickly, then all you ..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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e6f5c04
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Modern sentences are short. In Proust, we encounter sentences which appear interminable, meandering on and on in a way which suggests that the author had no desire to bring a satisfying or intriguing line of thought to any form of conclusion, wishing rather to prolong the pleasure, as one might wish if one were an author like Proust, who spent most of his time languishing in bed-he was a chronic hypochondriac-rather than experiencing life-a..
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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41655ff
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That at least was a consolation: separation and loss were something that we all experienced; the pain was shared, and was perhaps easier for that.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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646085b
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I'm taking on another person's memories, another person's family, another person's life. Love obscured all of that because if it did not, then nobody would marry at all, and there had to be marriage, didn't there, if people wanted to continue, have children, keep everything going...
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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430fc25
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usually better to seek the advice of a stranger--not just any stranger, of course, as one could hardly go out onto the street and confide in the first person one encountered, but a stranger whom you knew to be wise.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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e2d978f
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It had made her think of the moral flavour of music. Could music really have a moral quality in itself, or was it given this by the circumstances in which it was played - and by the reasons behind its performance. Music could be pressed into military service: a triumphal march would be good if played by the right side, and wrong if played by those in the wrong.
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Alexander McCall Smith |
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7eb2916
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Love and compassion are the only balm
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Alexander McCall Smith |