I would like to have been concerned about this existential threat sooner.

I've had some downturns in my career and various problems, but in fact all those kind of problems turned into something even better. It's kind of amazing, various times in my career.

And so, I went to Texas Tech El Paso. I could literally throw a stone out of my window and hit someone in Juárez, Mexico. And yet, it was the most beautiful place to practice, because in that county hospital we saw everything in young people, untreated; it felt very meaningful, but my evenings were mine to write and to develop my voice, and my weekends were mine. And I eventually got hired to Stanford in a roundabout way, largely because of that.

I was fortunate even from that point of view because I got a very good research collaboration agreement with Upjohn, the American Upjohn company. So that could help me to go on with my research.

I had followed the experts and put the money I had in television.

Everything I did, and I think everything Martin Luther King did, was because we allowed our lives to be in tune with what we felt to be a divine purpose. And it didn’t matter whether we lived or died. It didn’t matter how much money we made, or what we accomplished.

It was only with her help that I did everything. The tragedy was that after 40 years of marriage she died of cancer. I say that if Martin and I had not married the little country girls we married from Alabama, you never would have heard our names.

Her lesson all the time was “To them to whom much has been given, of them will much be required.”

[My father] used to say all the time, “You’re in a struggle, but if you get in a fight and lose your temper, you’ll lose the fight. So don’t get mad, get smart.”

It was only with her help that I did everything. The tragedy was that after 40 years of marriage she died of cancer.