March 27, 2019
Page 7
Arts &
ENTERTAINMENT
Michelle Obama departs Broadway Books in northeast
Portland after meeting with a culturally diverse reading
group prior to her Tuesday, March 19 event at the Moda
Center to discuss her 2018 memoir “Becoming.” The
former First Lady gave a sold-out talk where she mused on
the topics of family, her various careers, and keeping hope
alive in the new administration.
Up Close with Michelle Obama
Former First
Lady met with
local book club
As part of Michelle Obama’s
visit to Portland last week to dis-
cuss her 2018 memoir, “Becom-
ing,” the former First Lady ar-
ranged to meet with a local book
club to speak about the book, face-
to-face, with culturally diverse
community members.
Proprietors Kim Bissell and
Sally McPherson of Broadway
Books on Northeast Broadway
Street said they were excited to
fulfill the request. They had been
contacted through her publisher,
Crown Publishing Group, and ar-
ranged for Obama to meet with a
book club of 14 young women—
some native Oregonians and some
immigrants—who were white,
black, Asian, and Latina.
The group discussed how the
book resonated with them on the
topics of parenting, fleshing out
her identity, and her relationships
with her parents and older brother,
Craig Robinson, who was recently
Oregon State University’s men’s
head basketball coach.
The meet-up was followed by
the sold out show at the Moda
Center on March 19 that included
many powerful women in atten-
dance, such as Gov. Kate Brown,
in a moderated discussion of her
book and life that had been re-
scheduled due to a threat of in-
clement weather last February.
The audience, who gave Obama
multiple standing ovations, was
packed with fans clutching copies
of her book, toting handbags with
her face printed on it, and donning
shirts bearing the phrase “When
They Go Low, We go High.”
In the two hour discussion,
prompted by questions and mod-
erated by former White House
chef Sam Kass, she mused on
the topics of her upbringing in
Southside Chicago, marriage and
motherhood, her various careers
spanning from municipal govern-
ment to the nonprofit sector, and
keeping hope alive in the current
administration, though she did not
mention Trump by name.
“It is hard to hate up close,”
she said. “Change doesn’t start in
the White House. It starts in our
homes. Don’t despair. Just do the
work.”