By: Ron Chernow
Narrated by: Scott Brick
Length: 35 hrs and 58 mins
Release date: 12-26-04
Language: English

Chernow’s prose is beautiful, and he makes an enormous amount of history remarkably easy to follow. I have read numerous books about this era, with Hamilton appearing significantly in many of them, so this biography did not overturn my understanding of him. Instead, Chernow filled in the gaps and gave greater depth to the astonishing rise of a man from obscurity and the ignominy attached to his birth to become one of the founding pillars of the United States.

Hamilton actively sought greatness, and to an extraordinary degree he achieved it. His intelligence, energy, discipline, and determination allowed him to overcome circumstances that could easily have buried another man. He pushed through opposition and hardship when he believed he was right, and the nation benefited enormously from his willingness to do so. He was capable of walking beside the foremost men of the founding and contributing at their level.

Yet this book also helped me understand why Hamilton, though he walked among the foremost, did not ultimately become the foremost. He possessed several fundamental flaws that continued to appear throughout his life. They were not the most important things about him, nor should they overshadow the scale of his achievements. Still, they remain difficult to forget precisely because they stand in such sharp contrast to the greatness of the man. The dark places in his character appear darker because they are set against so much brilliance.

Washington provides a revealing contrast. Washington did not seem to seek greatness for himself. Rather, when greatness was required of him, he stood in the gap and rose to meet it. Like every great man, he had flaws, but he increasingly learned to govern himself, exercise restraint, and rise above them. Hamilton’s flaws seemed instead to continue working their way into his life. Rather than diminishing with maturity, they repeatedly returned in his political conflicts, his affair, his defense of his reputation, and finally his decision to participate in the duel.

Hamilton’s concern for his reputation is especially complicated because he was so often his own worst enemy. He defended his name fiercely and seemed unusually ready to perceive slights, yet his own choices sometimes caused more damage than his opponents could have managed. His affair and his disastrous attempt to explain it publicly are perhaps the clearest examples. His inability to allow a perceived insult to pass ultimately helped kill him.

It would be unfair simply to condemn these qualities, because they were closely connected to some of his greatest strengths. The intensity that made him defensive also allowed him to stand firm in difficult circumstances. The ambition that made him preoccupied with his legacy also drove him to accomplish an extraordinary amount. His tragedy was not that he possessed weaknesses, since every great man does, but that he never fully mastered the weaknesses that accompanied his strength.

Hamilton rose from nearly nothing and became capable of walking beside the greatest men of his age. He helped create institutions that long outlived him and demonstrated abilities that few people in any generation possess. Yet his life was cut short, partly through his own failings, before he could grow into the full greatness his gifts seemed to promise. I came away understanding more fully both why Hamilton was an extraordinary man and why his life was such a tragedy. I respect him greatly, but I do not admire him in the way I admire the other founding Fathers.