Despite never seeing the Tony Award winning musical I am unabashedly in love with the Hamilton soundtrack and while I plan to seek out Hamilton: The Revolution (as 
well as sell a kidney to see Hamilton when it comes to Dallas next year) I think Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton is a more expansive take on one of America’s founding fathers and I’m glad I started here. Lin-Manuel Miranda has made Hamilton a household name again after nearly two hundred years and Chernow’s biography played a big role in Miranda’s research.
“Hamilton’s relatively short life robbed him not only of any chance for further accomplishment but of the opportunity to mold his historical image.”
This is an exhaustive book. I listened to the audiobook on Overdrive and it is a 34 hour narration that ate up most of the last month for me but it is interesting and I’m glad I stuck with it. While this biography is focused on the life of America’s first treasury secretary there is also a lot about the build up to, fighting of and aftermath of the Revolutionary War as well as the Continental Congress and the French Revolution. Chernow is focused mainly on Hamilton but there is a lot of great information about George Washington, James Monroe, thomas Jefferson, George Clinton, Aaron Burr and countless other men who shaped the early decades of American government.
Chernow also gives Eliza Hamilton a lot of credit for the role she played in Hamilton’s career trajectory. She lived for decades after her husband’s death honoring his memory which had to be hard after he died in the exact same manner as their eldest son barely three years later, Alexander also had a highly public and humiliating affair during the peak of his political career that Eliza evidently forgave. Yes, America’s first treasury secretary also had America’s first political sex scandal. Oh, and the man who shaped our economy was in debt up to his eyeballs most of his life. Irony.
“In fact, no immigrant in American history has ever made a larger contribution than Alexander Hamilton”
As I said before this book is exhaustive and a bit exhausting at times. Chernow has a superhuman amount of research poured into this book including numerous quotes pulled from speeches, letters and other writings. Alexander Hamilton went from an orphan bastard in Nevis to the aide de camp for General George Washington during the Revolution and eventually became the de facto leader of the Federalist party with a pit stop as the man who shaped our economy.
As everyone knows Hamilton was killed by Vice President Aaron Burr in a dual which truncated Burr’s political career and robbed the United States of one of the most brilliant political minds the world has ever seen. I know not everyone likes 800 page occassionally dry books on dead white men but if you have an interest in early American history this is a great read. 
Also, can I add that between Aubrey Plaza and Leslie Odom Jr I have incredibly confusing sexual feelings about Aaron Burr?
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