Alexander McCall Smith

Writer

• Born: August 24, 1948
• Place of Birth: Bulawayo, Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe)

Biography

Alexander McCall Smith was born in Zimbabwe (then Southern Rhodesia) in 1948. He attended school in Bulawyo, near the Botswana border. He moved to Scotland to attend college and eventually settled in Edinburgh, where he became a professor of medical law at the University of Edinburgh. He also taught at the University of Botswana, where he helped establish a law program, and as a visiting professor in the United States, including twice at Southern Methodist University Law School in Dallas, Texas. He continued to visit Botswana, the setting for his best-known mysteries, the No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency series.

McCall Smith published more than eighty books on a wide range of subjects, including scholarly works in his field, literary novels, short stories, and books for children. Among his children’s novels are the widely translated The Perfect Hamburger (1982) and several mysteries, such as The Chocolate Money Mystery (1997). One of his collections of African stories, Children of Wax: African Folk Tales (1989), was the subject of an award-winning film.

The novel that brought him international acclaim and popularity was The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, in 1998. It received two Booker Judge’s Special Recommendations and a place on the Times Literary Supplement International Books of the Year and the Millennium. In 2004, McCall Smith was named Author of the Year in the British Books Awards.

The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was McCall Smith’s first mystery novel. He said he did not think of it as a mystery, but as a novel about a woman who happens to be a private detective. The woman is Mma Precious Ramotswe, a Botswana native, who inherits her father’s cattle and decides to sell them and establish a private detective business. She thus becomes the first and only woman private investigator in the country. Mma Ramotswe is described as a “traditional woman,” which is a reference to her size (hefty) rather than to any idea that women are second-class citizens. At the end of the novel, she becomes engaged to master mechanic Mr. J. L. B. Matekoni, but she is not married to him until the sixth book in the series, In the Company of Cheerful Ladies, and she does not take his last name.

She succeeds so well with her work that she hires an assistant, Mma Grace Makutsi. The cases they solve are usually in the category of personal problems rather than major crimes, and they solve them through their gentle understanding of people. The series is simply written, upbeat, and enjoyable, and it garnered a wide international readership. The series inspired a 2008 television series of the same name, which was filmed entirely in Botswana and was aired on the BBC and HBO.

McCall Smith has several other series as well. One features Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria Von Igelfeld. Another is a series set in Scotland featuring Isabel Dalhousie and the Sunday Philosophy Club. The Corduroy Mansions series, which takes place in London, debuted in 2008 as a serialized story published in the online edition of the Daily Telegraph newspaper; this "cross-media" endeavor won McCall Smith two awards, the 2009 Association of Online Publishers Digital Publishing Award and the 2009 New Media Age Effectiveness Award for Media. Yet another series, 44 Scotland Street, takes its name from the Edinburgh thoroughfare of the same name.

In 2014 McCall Smith published a well-received modern-day adaptation of Jane Austen's famous novel Emma. It, like his other novels, is noted for its gentle humor and moral characters. He continued to write and publish multiple books a year, many of them additions to his well-established series. In 2024, he launched a new series, The Perfect Passion Company, which follows the adventures of matchmaker Katie Donald. He also made numerous public appearances to meet fans and promote his writing.

McCall Smith was named a commander of the British Empire for his contributions to literature in 2007. He was also awarded honorary doctorates by more than a half-dozen universities in Europe and the United States.

As of 2024, McCall Smith had a spouse and two grown children. He lived in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Bibliography

"About the Author." Alexander McCall Smith. Little, Brown Book Group UK & Alexander McCall Smith, 2007–16. Web. 9 Mar. 2016.

Alexander McCall Smith, www.alexandermccallsmith.com/. Accessed 2 Oct. 2024.

"Alexander McCall Smith." Writer 117.11 (2004): 74. Print.

Hewitt, Chris. "Senior sleuths are the hottest thing in mysteries. Here’s 5 who take a page from ‘Murder, She Wrote’." Minnesota Star Tribune, 30 Sept. 2024, www.startribune.com/these-detectives-of-a-certain-age-are-creating-a-whole-mini-genre-call-it-murder-they-wrote/601154317. Accessed 2 Oct. 2024.

Hoffert, Barbara. "A Modern Emma." Rev. of Emma, by Alexander McCall Smith. Library Journal 139.20 (2014): 1. Print.

McCall Smith, Alexander. Interview. Readers Read. Writers Write, Feb. 2003. Web. 9 Mar. 2016.

McCall Smith, Alexander. "Taking Tea with Alexander McCall Smith." Interview by Connie Fletcher. Booklist 108.7 (2011): 26–27. PDF file.

"The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency." HBO. Home Box Office, 2016. Web. 9 Mar. 2016.