Jane Hawking

Through singing, I met my second husband, Jonathan, who is a professional musician. He transformed our lives and relieved me of much of the strain that I had been carrying for so long.

My philosophy is that while there's life, there's hope. It's as simple as that.

Stephen could be highly critical of people other than his closest relatives... He considered my friends to be easy victims and had no compunction in monopolizing the conversation at parties with his controversial opinions.

I suppose I was still optimistic and unrealistic, and I just hoped we could keep going as we were. But no. That was not good enough for Stephen, so off he went. Those were hard times. They really were. But then, I suppose, divorce is always hard.

We would look up at the night sky together, and although Stephen wasn't actually very good at detecting constellations, he would tell me about the expanding universe and the possibility of it contracting again and describe a star collapsing in on itself to form a black hole in a way that was quite easy to understand.

I did the first proofreading of 'A Brief History of Time,' and when it came to writing my memoir, I consulted many scientific friends so that, contrary to what many critics supposed and were churlish enough to voice, I did actually write the scientific sections myself.

Although a linguist, I was always interested in, and fascinated by, Stephen's explanations of his work and proud of his discoveries and achievements.

I had to be steadfast in my Christian beliefs, seeking strength from them.

The carer of the disabled person is always in the background. People don't want to hear about the sleaze and the nitty-gritty and the hardship.

The family and Stephen were my reason for being. Without that, I felt I was nothing.

I loved Stephen so much that nothing could deter me from wanting to marry him.

Intellectually, Stephen was a towering giant. Bodily, he was as helpless as a newborn. The functions I fulfilled were all maternal rather than marital.