People whose history and future were threatened each day by extinction considered that it was only by divine intervention that they were able to live at all. I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest existence, is attributed to God's will, but as human beings become more affluent, as their living standard and style begin to ascend the material scale, God descends the scale of responsibility at a commensurate speed.

As Gillespie states "If 1968 was a year of great pain loss and sadness it was also the year when America first witnessed the breadth and depth of Maya Angelou's spirit and creative genius". As of 2008 Maya Angelou owned two homes in Winston-Salem North Carolina and one in Harlem full of her "growing library" of books Maya Angelou has collected throughout her life artwork collected over the span of many decades and well-stocked kitchens. Angelou has one son Guy whose birth was described in her first autobiography one grandson and two young great-grandchildren and according to Gillespie a large group of friends and extended family.

She is respected as a spokesperson of Black people and women and her works have been considered a defense of Black culture. : /ˈmaɪ. Maya Angelou (pron.