top of page
"She brought a chair into the room and placed it alongside the top of his bed. Then she held his hand as he drifted off to sleep. It was so small in her own hand, and it felt warm and dry. She pressed his hand gently, and his fingers returned the pressure, but only just, as he was almost asleep by then. She remembered, but not very well, what it was to fall asleep holding the hand of another; how precious such an experience, how fortunate those to whom it was vouchsafed by the gods of Friendship, or of Love. She thought she had forgotten that, but now she remembered."
Standard
Customized
Exlpore more Relationship quotes

"Treacherous people do not last only memories of their treason last.So will it last with emotions mixed, of love and hate for treacherous ones."

"Marriage has many pains but celibacy has no pleasures."

"Marriage is one sweet way in which one can taste heaven on earth. Similarly, I can also become hell on earth."

"Now is the time when you see people which you know... but they start ignoring you... and how do you deal with that?"

"The friend that always finds time to spend with you without consulting his or her calendar is a true friend."

"... Good gracious, Jerry, you'll probably have to marry the girl.'Joanna was half serious, half laughing.It was at that moment that I made a very important discovery.'Damn it all,' I said. 'I don't mind if I do. In fact - I should like it.'A very funny expression came over Joanna's face. She got up and said dryly, as she went toward the door, 'Yes, I've known that for some time...'She left me standing, glass in hand, aghast at my new discovery."

"Amazing relationships aren't about making one perfect choice in your choice of partner. They're about the infinite amount of choices you make in each conflict, each conversation, and each moment to open yourself and to stay open, even when it's hard."

"That's how you tell what a man's really made of. It's one thing for a man to be big and brave and kill a spider. Any man could do that. Trailin' after a woman when she's shopping for thongs and push-up bras is a whole other category of man. And then if you want to see how far you can go with it, you ask him to carry one of those little pink bags they give you."

"I wasn't in love with her. And she didn't love me. For me the question of love was irrelevant. What I sought was the sense of being tossed about by some raging, savage force, in the midst of which lay something absolutely crucial. I had no idea what that was. But I wanted to thrust my hand right inside her body and touch it, whatever it was."

"Maybe I shouldn't have told you""about it being electrical. She put her hand out, touched his arm; she felt guilty, seeing the effect it had on him, the change."No," Rick said. "I'm glad to know. Or rather""" He became silent. "I'd prefer to know."
Explore more quotes by Alexander McCall Smith

"The value of money is subjective, depending on age. At the age of one, one multiplies the actual sum by 145,000, making one pound seem like 145,000 pounds to a one-year-old. At seven " Bertie's age " the multiplier is 24, so that five pounds seems like 120 pounds. At the age of twenty four, five pounds is five pounds; at forty five it is divided by 5, so that it seems like one pound and one pound seems like twenty pence. (All figures courtesy of Scottish Government Advice Leaflet: Handling your Money.)"

"It was always the best way of finding out information; just go and ask a woman who keeps her eyes and ears open and who likes to talk. It always worked. It was no use asking men; they simply were not interested enough in other people and the ordinary doings of people. That is why the real historians of Africa had always been the grandmothers, who remembered the lineage and the stories that went with it."

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

"That was what counted, she told herself: those unexpected moments of appreciation, unanticipated glimpses of beauty or kindness - any of the things that attached us to this world, that made us forget, even for a moment, its pain and its transience."

"The only thing that makes me sad is that I shall be leaving Africa when I die. I love Africa, which is my mother and my father. When I am dead, I shall miss the smell of Africa."

"There is a tidal wave of ignorance, Mma Ramotswe. It is a great tidal wave and it will drown all of us if we are not careful."

"If she was going to remain an engaged lady, then she would make the most of it, and one of the ways to do this would be to enjoy her free time."

"Sociopaths are attracted to politics because the see it as a sphere in which you can be ruthless and step all over people. That fact that some politicians can tell such awful lies is another example of sociopathy. Sociopaths lie-they see nothing wrong with it."

"The ordinary people of Africa tended not to have room in their hearts for hatred. They were sometimes foolish, like people anywhere, but they did not bear grudges, as Mr Mandela had shown the world."

"International business, once allowed to stalk uncontrolled, killed the local, the small, the quirky."
bottom of page