Unauthorized Biography of Michelle Obama
Bigraphy Gives Inside Look at First African American First Lady
Jun 9, 2009
She was staunchly opposed to her husband, Barack Obama, running for the presidency, in fact, she didn´t even want him to run for the U.S. Senate. At the end, Michelle became one of the biggest assets in Barack Obama´s campaign.
First African American First Lady
As it says in the book, now she´s not just [the] first lady, but the first African American first lady.
Liza Mundy took on the task of explaining the life of this historical, and at times complex figure, in her book Michelle, a biography by Liza Mundy. (Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 230 pages, $15.00).
In this unauthorized biography Mundy takes us back to before Michelle was born, in 1964, and explains the background of a woman that has broken down barriers throughout her whole life.
Humble Beginnings
A Harvard and Princeton graduate, this descendant of slaves comes from humble beginnings; her father had attained a job as a janitor three days before she was born.
The second child of the Robinson family grew up as discrimination was slowly receding. The book states that six months after she was born, the 1964 Civil Rights Act was signed into law. When she was a little girl her family was able to move to a good and safe neighborhood on the South Side of Chicago, a neighborhood previously open only to white people.
In many ways Michelle Obama´s story isn´t different from that of any other African American. She had to face inequality and discrimination in order to overcome. As a matter of fact this has helped Obama in his campaign when people have accused him of not being, as some said, black enough.
Meeting Barack Obama
Mundy delineates Michelle´s life from the moment she was born, through High School and College, and then to the moment she meets Barack Obama in the corporate law offices of Sidley Austin LLP.
From that moment on the book tells a story that some of the American public more or less knows, and explains some of the controversies that surround Michelle Obama. She has been in the media´s radar from the moment it seemed Barack had a chance of becoming president.
Mundy shows the reader how the Obama´s work together by explaining the path that lead the Obama´s to where they are today. She does a good job of making the Obama´s more real.
More importantly she catalogs a woman that has now become a part of American history forever.
Liza Mundy has been a staff writer at the Washington Post for over 10 years. She is a graduate from Princeton University, and lives in Virginia.
