Alexander McCall Smith
Alexander McCall Smith was eight when he wrote his first book. It was a one-page melodrama called ‘He’s Gone’, and the little boy was so chuffed that he decided it should be in print.
‘I don’t remember what it was about – where he went, or why he went, I’ve absolutely no idea – but I sent it off to a publisher, which was rather ambitious, and I got a letter back!’ he exclaims.
‘It was an encouraging letter saying thank you very much, but unfortunately they couldn’t publish it. But what a nice thing to do! Had I received a discouraging letter, I may have given up.’
Fortunately for his multitude of fans, he didn’t. The former law professor has gone on to publish more than 110 books, ranging from academic tomes to children’s stories, but is best known for his warm and witty No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series, selling an astonishing 25 million copies in 46 languages.
The 20th adventure featuring Botswana’s answer to Miss Marple, the traditionally-built Mma Precious Ramotswe, is out next month. Called To The Land of Long Lost Friends, it centres on an old schoolpal who’s having a dilemma with her daughter. Yet as ever, the pleasure lies not in the plot, but in the gentle, rambling conversations between the shrewd detective and her quirky friends.
‘I suppose it’s the setting, and the person,’ says the avuncular 71-year-old, musing on why the series is so popular. ‘People like Mma Ramotswe because she’s a comfortable character. She’s a kind woman, somebody with whom you’d like to have a cup of tea. If we’re out of sympathy with characters in a book, we can feel quite irritated.’
Although she solves mysteries rather than murders, Mma Ramotswe was inspired by, of all things, a woman strangling a chicken. Alexander was staying with friends in Botswana who’d been promised poultry for lunch, ‘and I saw this woman standing outside her house, wearing a red dress, and she went out and chased the chicken round the yard. There was dust and feathers and whatnot, and I thought “Oh, what an interesting woman!” and just wondered about her life.
‘That bubbled away in my subconscious mind, and I sat down and wrote about Mma Ramotswe years later. It’s not based on her, but seeing her just triggered the thought. Sometimes as a writer you see a particular scene, or a person, or somebody says something, and that leads to the inspiration for a story. It can happen at any moment.’
That love of good stories has been with Alexander since childhood. Growing up with his three older sisters in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), where his father was a public prosecutor, he spent his days buried in everything from poetry to encyclopaedias. ‘I read voraciously,’ he says. ‘I devoured books.’
He left Africa for Edinburgh University in his late teens and stayed in academia, becoming an expert in medical law while penning fiction for pleasure. The White Hippo, his first of more than 30 children’s books, was published in 1980 after he won a literary competition, but it wasn’t until years later that he struck gold with a book for adults. Published in 1998, The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was a runaway success, and the professor realised he’d have to swap law for literature.
‘I write every day. It’s something that I have to do, and I get a little bit jumpy if I don’t do it,’ says Alexander, who gets up at 3am to type 4,000 words before returning to bed a few hours later. This impressive output results in five or six books a year, both standalones and series – such as the 44 Scotland Street novels, which tell the whimsical tales of a clutch of eccentric neighbours.
‘I enjoy all the books, but some of the chapters in the Scotland Street series would be me having my very greatest fun, particularly when I’m writing about young Bertie,’ he says of the series’ 7-year-old prodigy. ‘Poor Bertie, he’s really such a nice little boy, but oh my goodness his mother is dreadful! I enjoy Bertie’s funny view of the world; I like looking at the unusual view of the world that people have. Often there’s a dog in the books, and we see things from their point of view. They don’t talk, but I like thinking “How did the dog feel?”’ he says, and laughs.
Inevitably certain critics are sniffy about the sunny nature of his books. ‘Sniffy and snooty. Yes, some people have been very condescending to me,’ he admits. ‘But I find that very strange, the idea that a writer is expected to be grim and bleak.
‘There are many bleak things in the world, but there are also many positive, joyous and affirmative things, and I think to concentrate on one to the exclusion of the other is odd. It’s perfectly possible to be a positive writer, to write about emotions of love, and happiness, and fulfilment, and that’s not to say that there shouldn’t be writing about the opposite of those, but there’s room for both.
‘We’ve had letters from psychiatrists who’ve prescribed my books for depression, and we get letters from people who say that Mma Ramotswe in particular has helped them in difficult times, when they were undergoing chemo, for example, and I’m really touched by that,’ he adds. ‘It wasn’t my objective, but I’m utterly delighted she seems to have that cheering effect on people.’
So he’s never tempted to write anything with a body count? ‘No. There’s not much you can say about evil. We know it exists, but it’s far more interesting to look at human possibility rather than human negativity.’
:: The Peppermint Tea Chronicles, a 44 Scotland Street novel, is out now. To The Land of Long Lost Friends, a No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency novel, is out on September 5.
Total McCall
The writer lives in Edinburgh with his wife Elizabeth, a retired GP, and has two daughters who are both doctors.
His newest series, the Inspector Varg novels – about a Swedish detective and his deaf dog, Martin – are typically light on crime: he describes them as Scandi blanc rather than Scandi noir.
A keen yet bungling bassoonist, Alexander started The Really Terrible Orchestra 20 years ago to give other hopeless musicians a chance to play together. Surprisingly popular, they perform at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival every year.
He has written a children’s series about Precious Ramotswe as a young girl, who solves mysteries about missing cakes, missing cows and even missing parents. Mma Ramotswe has also featured in a Radio 4 series, BBC TV series and cookbook, and the author is in talks about a stage musical.
An edited version of this interview appeared in Waitrose Weekend on August 22nd 2019. (c) Waitrose