By Alison Campbell & Cathy Martin
‘Becoming’ is a beautiful, inspiring and engrossing piece of work from the former First Lady of the USA, Michelle Obama. If you’ve ever wanted to laugh, cry and cheer for someone all at once, I promise you will do it in this. Without a doubt, Michelle Obama has to be one of the most influential women of our time and the way she tells her story (stories, actually) in Becoming shows us just how relatable and down to earth she is.
The memoir has been divided into three parts, Becoming Me, Becoming Us, and Becoming More - each as captivating as the next.
‘Becoming Me’ talks about her upbringing and childhood struggles in the south side of Chicago as Michelle Robinson. She discussed her father’s fight with MS, as well as an early experience with the police alongside her brother, which would teach her early on how the colour of their skin made them vulnerable. She travelled over an hour every day to get to school, but even then her drive, conscientiousness and ambition was clear. Some say perfectionism is a negative thing, but Michelle wanted to be more than a stereotypical South Side black girl, she wanted to be more and strove to achieve each goal along the way.
‘Becoming Us’ is, as you can imagine, all about meeting Barack. But before deep diving into their love story she talks about feeling isolated as being one of only 9% of black classmates at Princeton. She fought and got into Princeton to join her brother, but it was here that she began to really see the race and class differences, which, instead of fighting against, she strove to beat in a different way, by being better than a black statistic.
‘Becoming More’ is the most personal part of the book, as it talks a lot about the struggles of being the First Lady, and the criticism she dealt with, but also her passion for the varying charities, campaigns and foundations that she supported (and continues to do so). She talks about her pride at raising her children and wanting their lives to be as normal as was possible within the confines of the White House bubble. No mean feat!
As expected, the book brings a very different perspective to the public persona that is and was an esteemed American First Lady. We often don’t hear of the late night struggles and sacrifices that have to be made, or the worries that her girls wouldn’t make friends because of who they are.
The book demonstrates further that she is the epitome of a strong woman - and has had to be from an early age - but a lot of it is quiet strength. She has the quiet inner confidence of a lady who is polite and kind, but is not afraid to speak out where she sees wrong. And we all know we need more women like that! Wasn’t it another former First Lady, Eleanor Roosevelt, who said if you don’t speak up against oppression you stand on the side of the oppressor? Well if it wasn’t her, it was probably something she’d align herself to, as she was a steely First Lady like MO too. Outside of the book, we at The F Words loved how Michelle plain as day called Trump a bully during the Presidential campaign. And it’s great that she (and Barack) continue to do so.
Overall this is a book of inspiration and shows that anything is possible if you put your mind to it and have good people around you. A great read.