"Dr Angelou taught all women that self-worth has nothing to do with what the world might say.For me, “that was the power of Maya Angelou’s words, words so powerful they carried a little black girl from the south side of Chicago all the way to the White House. She touched me, she touched all of you, she touched people all across the globe, including a young white woman from Kansas who named her daughter after Maya and raised her son to be the first African American president of the United States.She was the master. For at a time when there were such stifling constraints on how a black woman could exist in the world, she serenely disregarded all the rules with fiercely, passionate unapologetic self.She was comfortable in every last inch of her glorious black skin. But for Dr Angelou, her own transition was never enough. You see, she didn’t just want to be phenomenal herself. She wanted all of us to be phenomenal right along side her." Michelle Obama First Lady of the United States

Bill Clinton recalled the last time he saw Dr Angelou, a few weeks ago at a ceremony to mark the 50th anniversary of the passing of the Civil Rights Act.The former president, at whose 1993 inauguration Angelou read her poem "On the Pulse of Morning", told her he was surprised to see her out and about.Angelou replied: “Just because I am wheelchair bound, doesn’t mean I don’t get around.”