Barack Obama’s meteoric rise on the political scene has challenged many preconceived ideas. It has certainly shown that hope attracts voters and galvanizes people’s spirits. Obama is not only a charismatic and talented orator but he is also a good writer, author of, ‘’Dreams From My Father” and “The Audacity of Hope.” When it became clear that Obama was a potential presidential candidate, his books became a primary source of information. However, if the life and whereabouts of the future president of the United States were well publicized and easily available on the Internet, the same could not be said about his wife. In fact, very little was known at the time about Michelle Obama.
When CNN featured Michelle Obama being interviewed by Larry King, the program turned out to be a unique opportunity to get acquainted with a possible first lady. Michelle Obama gave a stunning performance which only whet the public’s appetite for more, in other words, the time was ripe for a book detailing the life of a possible first lady of the United States.
Written by the Harvard-educated, Elizabeth Lightfoot, “Michelle Obama: First Lady of Hope,” is a quintessentially American story. This biography brings us some interesting information about Michelle’s family which, unlike her husband’s, was constantly there for her and still is: Her mother quit her job at a bank to give her granddaughters, Malia and Sasha, a stable family life in the White House. One of the most important lessons she learned from her parents was the irreplaceable importance of parents in a child’s life.
Michelle LaVaughn Robinson was brought up in a rented one-bedroom apartment. She still marvels at the way her father, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis at the age of thirty, could raise a family of four on such a meager salary. Her hard-working parents taught their children to study hard, reach high and never give up: “My parents told us time and again ‘don’t tell us what you can’t do, and don’t worry about what can go wrong,’” says Michelle.
She excelled in school and even skipped second grade. Her brother Craig says that his sister “really does hate to loose, and that’s why she’s been so successful”. Michelle is known for leaving a high-paying job at a top Chicago law firm to go into public service.
People who have worked with Michelle Obama have described her as ‘a dynamo’ and her brother Craig vouches that she works harder than anyone he knows. She is also demanding at home where she insists that her husband makes his bed and takes out the garbage and her children help with household chores. She pressures her husband into attending important family events such as parent-teacher meetings, holidays and birthdays. She seriously weighed the pros and the cons of her husband’s presidential candidacy and decided to back his bid for president only if he quit smoking!
The Obamas seem to have an excellent marriage based on humor, on spending time together and believing in each other and in the future. Michelle once said in an interview that her husband never promised her a wealthy life, only a life that would be interesting and in that respect, he had kept his promise.
She met her future husband at Sidley Austin; she had been assigned to mentor a promising young summer associate who in his spare time would speak to an underprivileged audience. On one occasion, she accompanied him and witnessed the way, he asked them to imagine “a world as it could be” rather than accepting “a world as it is.”
“What I saw in him on that day was authenticity and truth and principle. That’s who I fell in love with,” says Michelle.
Reflecting on the first lady’s role in American history, she believes that every first lady has brought something different:
“I think it has been an evolution that has gotten us to this point where I can be here, potentially to become the next first lady, with all of my outspokenness and my approach to life and the things that I say.”
This book, written in a couple of months during Obama’s presidential campaign, is not only well researched but well written. Moreover, the author draws an appealing portrait. She candidly admits that: “It was a true pleasure to delve into the life of someone as multi-dimensional as Michelle Obama... There was much about Michelle’s path that spoke to me as a woman, wife, and mother, just as her example speaks to millions of others. I hope in some way, by collecting it all in one place and by reflecting on it from my vantage point, I have created a more exclusive portrait of a remarkable and historic figure. “It is difficult not to sympathize with the author’s feelings that so much of the story has yet to take place. The book ends, and history is being made. We can only hope that Michelle Obama herself will eventually agree to write her memoirs.