That was the turning point. It was as though the signal was there, 'This is the disease you're going to have to work against.' I never really stopped to think about anything else. It was that sudden.

The Nobel Prize is fine, but the drugs I've developed are rewards in themselves.

Nobody . . . took me seriously. They wondered why in the world I wanted to be a chemist when no women were doing that. The world was not waiting for me.

I had no specific bent towards science until my grandfather, who died - that summer - of stomach cancer. ... I decided that nobody should suffer that much.

Maybe I was young and 'cute' (after all, I was only twenty then), but I've learned over the years that when you put white lab coats on chemists, they all look alike!

I had no specific bent toward science until my grandfather died of stomach cancer. I decided that nobody should suffer that much.

I had no specific bent toward science until my grandfather died of cancer. I decided nobody should suffer that much.

Live for everything, or die for nothing

Failure is something made only by those who fail to dare not by those who dare to fail.

Only I can change my life. No one can do it for me.

Without education, you are not going anywhere in this world.

I am a compulsive worker. But I'm also a compulsive relaxer.

I don't do farm animals. Can't stand hay in your leathers? Or wool in my teeth.

I still think of that guy I was without a wife or kids, and I still want to entertain that guy. The lonely guy, the frustrated guy, the guy with no money - this is the guy who needs to laugh.

Demons live in many lands, but particularly in Prussia.

Posterity will pay everyone their due.

Reciting lines is hard; making stuff up is much, much easier.