The following is an interview with Joan Steitz, Sterling Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry, and Howard Hughes Investigator at Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut. The interview was conducted by her close friends and colleagues, John Abelson, Professor Emeritus and George Beadle Professor of Biology at Cal Tech, and Christine Guthrie, Professor Emeritus and American Cancer Society Research Professor of Genetics at the University of California, San Francisco. The interview was recorded at John Abelson and Christine Guthrie’s home in San Francisco, California on April 25, 2019.