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They didn't know whether it was unconventional or just black!

I was trying to get a non-code word in there. But this brings to my mind a statement for which I'm indebted to Art Buchwald, the humorist, where in a--

-- he's a brilliant social philosopher, by the way.

-- in a broadcast interview, he responded to some question -- “Well,” he said, “there can't be more than one of me -- there's a licensing system, and they're going to let one person go around being the Puck or the needle that I am, but they're not going to let many more, if any more.”

Has it ever occurred to you that perhaps, as they watched your evolution in your younger period, that they gave you a license? That they were looking for somebody like you to tell them -- even perhaps in a vague sort of way -- “Here's somebody that we want to just, well, we want to give him his head.”

My professors?

I would put it in a broader context.

Well, let me break it up. My professors? I don't think so.

You hadn't discussed this kind of question.

No. That's just my impressions. My professors at Columbia seemed more fixated on the fact that I was not white, and that I