Hamilton: Book form, not musical

 Like most who watched the Disney-broadcast version of Hamilton: The Musical, I've been singing songs and remembering its highlights. I went one better, downloaded the Ron Chernow biography on which it is based. I'm within 50 pages of finishing. 

I recommend it, although I realize few would take me up on it. It is 700 pages. The thing I've enjoyed most, beyond Hamilton's roller coaster life story and Chernow's writing, is all the history of the Revolutionary and early Constitutional period. So, some observations:

1. Jefferson was really a jerk. I daresay Washington would not be pleased that Jefferson is up there on Mt. Rushmore with him. The way he's portrayed in the musical doesn't begin to display his jerkiness, although Miranda has some fun with him. "What Did I Miss" is one of my favorite numbers.

2. Those politics made ours look polite. Good grief, they were crazy mean!

3. Hamilton was brilliant and more or less designed the country, but he had some tragic flaws that Shakespeare couldn't have thought up. 

4. We don't realize how brittle our republic was in those first thirty years. 

5. I need to read The Federalist Papers. 

Next up, Dune. I hear the new movie version has been postponed. I guess they learned from Tenet. I've been to the movies and would like to go again soon. Apparently I'm in the minority.