Quotes From "The Sunday Philosophy Club" By Alexander McCall Smith

There was a distinction between lying and telling half-truths, but...
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There was a distinction between lying and telling half-truths, but it was a very narrow one. Alexander McCall Smith
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She had argued for a broad interpretation, which imposed a duty to answer questions truthfully, and not to hide facts which could give a different complexion to a matter, but on subsequent thought she had revised her position. Although she still believed that one should be frank in answers to questions, this duty arose only where there was an obligation, based on a reasonable expectation, to make a full disclosure. There was no duty to reveal everything in response to a casual question by one who had no right to the information. Alexander McCall Smith
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For a short while she considered the idea of orchestral courtesy. Certainly one should avoid giving political offence: German orchestras, of course, used to be careful about playing Wagner abroad, at least in some countries, choosing instead German composers who were somewhat more ... apologetic. Alexander McCall Smith
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Great art, she felt, had a calming effect on the viewer; it made one stop in awe, which is exactly what Damien Hirst and Andy Warhol did not do. You did not stop in awe. They stopped you in your tracks, perhaps, but that was not the same thing; awe was something quite different Alexander McCall Smith
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She was made for untidy rooms and rumpled beds. Alexander McCall Smith
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But he'll never be fully recognised, because Scots literature these days is all about complaining and moaning and being injured in one's soul. Alexander McCall Smith
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The language of Cat's generation was far harder than that of her own, and more pithily correct: in their terms, he was a hunk. But why, she wondered, should anybody actually want a hunk, when non-hunks were so much more interesting? Alexander McCall Smith
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We can't have moral obligations to every single person in this world. We have moral obligations to those who we come up against, who enter into our moral space, so to speak. That means neighbors, people we deal with, and so on. Alexander McCall Smith
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This was a townscape raised in the teeth of cold winds from the east; a city of winding cobbled streets and haughty pillars; a city of dark nights and candlelight, and intellect. Alexander McCall Smith