Rating: 
Summary: beautiful portrait of an inspired patriot
Review: The cliche "..ought to be required reading" is truly applied to this wonderful book. We are introduced to a man of the most expansive and inclusive intellect, who commands our respect because he is also a man of honor. This people in this wonderful country of ours should refer to the life of Hamilton for a timeless reminder of the good fortune we have in being Americans.As a result of this book, I have begun readings of other American founders including John Adams and George Washington. Talk about inspired timeless genius!!! Thank you Mr. Brookheiser.
Rating:
Summary: A Great Founder Revisited
Review: In this well-written, level-headed book, Brookhiser gives Hamilton his just due as one of our nation's most important historical figures. As a born outsider, Hamilton comes across as one of the first "true Americans" in the modern sense of the word. As opposed to Thomas Jefferson, who when saying "my country" meant Virginia first and foremost, Hamilton held a much broader and deeper and significant view of what it means to be an American. It was this take on self-identity that helped forge a nation after the Revolutionary war - that stopped it from being torn asunder by ugly political infighting, shabby economics and blatant "anti-Tory" dispossession. While Hamilton's passion was the key to his meteoric rise, it was also the seed of his undoing. In that famous duel with Aaron Burr in Weekhawken, NJ, a great life was extinguished from the world prematurely. Thanks to Brookhiser, it is brought out into the light once again, and, as every reader would agree, is surely worth reconsidering.
Rating:
Summary: Thank you, Mr. Brookhiser
Review: This book is long overdue. While our bookstores are glutted with books on Jefferson, we had only McDonald's bio of Hamilton left in print. Flexner's odd "Young Hamilton" was recently rereleased, not much of a comfort to Hamiltonians. Michael Lind's "Hamilton's Republic" gave me hope that perhaps Alexander was finally being dragged out of obscurity into the much deserved limelight he always craved. I've read most of the biographies on Hamilton and I'd rate Brookhiser number one on readability and vivid portrayal. If you're looking for more detail, try to track down Hendrickson's long out of print two volume work. It's a tad eccentric but a hell of a good read. Forrest McDonald's bio is excellent as is John Miller's. If you stumble onto Frederick Scott Oliver's 1921 bio, gobble it up. It's way too worshipful but it illustrates excellently how an earlier generation held Hamilton in much higher esteem than they did Jefferson. Broadus Mitchell shows you don't have to be conservative to find Hamilton an inspiration. When you finish with Mr. Brookhiser, if you have time to read only one more book on Hamilton, without a doubt the one to read is Clinton Rossiter's "Alexander Hamilton and the Constiution." A brilliant, brillaint study. After reading Rossiter I was a Hamitonian for life. I hope Brookhiser has a similar effect on a new generation of readers. Sadly, as stated above, most of these books are out of print so Brookhiser's work is very much appreciated.
Rating:
Summary: Finally! A fair, much-needed assessment of THE Founder.....
Review: Given that this is the first major biography of Hamilton since Forrest McDonald's over 20 years ago, I was quite excited to see the release of this book. While it is far from a comprehensive, detailed historical opus, it does analyze his importance to the history of this nation, especially in terms of his nationalism, belief in the primacy of the federal government, and most important, the desire to foster America's industrial, capitalist, and military strength. To Jefferson we owe our idealism, but to Hamilton we owe our true sense of self; the power and self-confidence that stems from economic progress and advancement. In addition, Hamilton was against slavery far in advance of many others, and his writings (especially "The Federalist Papers") are vast and far-reaching. This is a great introduction to Hamilton and I hope it inspires others to re-evaluate this key figure in our national identity.
Rating:
Summary: Very bad picture
Review: I haven't read the book yet, but why did they pick such a positively demonic picture of Hamilton for the cover? This is obviously a version of Trumbull's portrait which was based on a sculpture by Cerrachi, but I have never seen any other reproduction of this that made Alexander look so bald or so like he had actual horns. What gives ?
Rating:
Summary: Thank you, Mr. Brookhiser
Review: This book is long overdue. While our bookstores are glutted with books on Jefferson, we had only McDonald's bio of Hamilton left in print. Flexner's odd "Young Hamilton" was recently rereleased, not much of a comfort to Hamiltonians. Michael Lind's "Hamilton's Republic" gave me hope that perhaps Alexander was finally being dragged out of obscurity into the much deserved limelight he always craved. I've read most of the biographies on Hamilton and I'd rate Brookhiser number one on readability and vivid portrayal. If you're looking for more detail, try to track down Hendrickson's long out of print two volume work. It's a tad eccentric but a hell of a good read. Forrest McDonald's bio is excellent as is John Miller's. If you stumble onto Frederick Scott Oliver's 1921 bio, gobble it up. It's way too worshipful but it illustrates excellently how an earlier generation held Hamilton in much higher esteem than they did Jefferson. Broadus Mitchell shows you don't have to be conservative to find Hamilton an inspiration. When you finish with Mr. Brookhiser, if you have time to read only one more book on Hamilton, without a doubt the one to read is Clinton Rossiter's "Alexander Hamilton and the Constiution." A brilliant, brillaint study. After reading Rossiter I was a Hamitonian for life. I hope Brookhiser has a similar effect on a new generation of readers. Sadly, as stated above, most of these books are out of print so Brookhiser's work is very much appreciated.
Rating:
Summary: 5 stars for Hamilton, but Brookhiser is disappointing
Review: I read this book while at the same time reading The Federalist Papers. Whatever one's opinion is of Hamilton's political beliefs, he was an extremely persuasive writer. As I read his articles supporting the new constitution I felt transported back to 1787, as though I were reading them in today's newspaper. They are as fresh today as the day Hamilton wrote them, his passion making the issues come alive on the page. Hamilton's vivid prose makes Brookhiser's dry and stilted style all the more obvious by contrast. Brookhiser reads like a PhD thesis, not a brief popular biography. The facts are there, but Hamilton is dead on the page. To feel Hamilton come alive, read The Federalist, not Brookhiser. To be fair to Brookhiser, he repeatedly comments on Hamilton's persuasive writing style, even though he is himself unable to emulate it.
Brookhiser clearly dislikes both Jefferson and Burr, Hamilton's major political antagonists, but he does not present those conflicts with the vividness and drama they deserve.
Curiously, nowhere in Brookhiser's fairly detailed account of Hamilton's long entanglement with Maria Reynolds does he mention his wife Betsy's reaction to the relationship. Hamilton was clearly a complicated man, who inspired great loyalty and admiration in spite of his faults. But Betsy must have had something to say about the whole thing.
Brookhiser says almost nothing about Hamilton's military record, which was impressive by any standard.
Hamilton was far more conservative than anyone on the American political scene today. Still, he was a subtle and complex thinker. Hamilton persuaded Americans to accept a constitution that was (and is) much more conservative than the general temper of the majority of the American people. He convinced them to accept a government none of them wanted, in spite of themselves, by demonstrating clearly and repeatedly the dangerous position the American States were in due to the incompetence of the Continental Congress and the inherent weakness of the Articles of Confederation, and how badly they needed a strong central government. Hamilton's urgency and concern practically leap off of every page of The Federalist, on issues that trouble American politics to this day. Brookhiser manages to make it all seem like old news, dry as dry toast.
A minor point: I found that the quirky typeface made the book more difficult to read, especially with all the quotations.
In spite of its shortcomings, this book should be read by every thinking American, regardless of political persuasion. Even more important is to read Hamilton himself, in The Federalist, in order to understand how and why our form of ordered political liberty came into being.
Rating: 
Summary: Why Alexander Hamilton Should Remain on the Ten-Dollar Bill
Review: Brookhiser offers a very opinionated view of Alexander Hamilton, defending him from his detractors over the years, and showing just how instrumental a role Hamilton had in the American Revolution and the post-Revolutionary government. Brookhiser skips lightly over Hamilton's early years in the Caribbean, which are rather cloudy to begin with, and also his formative years in America. He focuses on Hamilton's role in promoting the new Constitution in the Federalist Papers and before the New York Convention, which eventually approved it, overcoming the staunch anti-Federalists in the state such as Aaron Burr. Hamilton emerges as a man who saw the forest through the trees, one step ahead of his political opponents until they eventually caught up to him in the early 19th century. He was a man of immense intellect who has to be considered the father of our economy, with so many far-reaching ideas that they are still with us today. The book is a little short for a man of such national importance, but it is easily accessible and will provide the reader with a good overall impression of the man, who was our nation's first Secretary of the Treasury.
Rating:
Summary: "This is a Mortal Wound, Doctor"-Alexander Hamilton
Review: Good Friday, April 9, 2004 I should listen to my mother more often. "Never talk about religion or politics." That's hard to do, however, in an election year! However, my mother is usually correct. (My Hamilton roots come from my mother's, mother's, mother, Molly Hamilton Summers. This Scots-Irish branch of my family is also the bookworm branch in the family. My mother's reading a book right now!) I find it funny that most of Hamilton's modern day biographers hold predominantly republican sentiments. Richard Brookhiser is an editor of The National Review, a conservative publication with strong right leanings. My mother tells me too that it's good that there are Republicans as well as Democrats, although I'm still somewhat skeptical! After calming down from my initial upset over Brookhiser's estimation of Alexander's father's character, (he states repeatedly that he was a bum), I've carefully read every word of the book. Brookhiser's analysis of Hamilton and other patriots is fair-minded for the most part. The book is only 200 plus pages, and so is not an in-depth analysis of Hamilton or his achievements as McDonald's is. Brookhiser's book should be read before McDonald's; I think it would make McDonald's less cumbersome to read. Again, Forrest McDonald's book is incredibly well researched, no doubt about it. Brookhiser includes some of my favorite quotes by or about Hamilton, although my favorite story about his life is not. Whatever you think about the duel, Princeton University, at one time, contained evidence of Alexander's markmanship on their walls. During the battle of Princeton, Alexander fired his cannon at a picture of King George III, the Hanoverian king of Britain, totally smashing it head on! The frame was saved and the portrait was switched to one of General George Washington! Alexander had decided against Princeton and enrolled at Columbia where he could study at his own fast speed. I think Forrest McDonald's assessment of Burr is more thorough. It seems to me, the real issue between them was financial/political, not just a "character" issue on Burr's part. However, Brookhiser' biography is probably more realistic and forgiving in his analysis of Jefferson, Adams, Madison and others who did not share Hamilton's views in the last years of his life. What I liked most about this book was that Alexander's feats/defeats are told within the continental context through which they were unfolding. It's a good review of the basics in American colonial history.
Rating:
Summary: A great man - an honest biograhy
Review: I like Richard Brookhiser's biographies of the founders. They tell us about the man by dealing with the issues of his life using the chronology to give context and substance to these issues. This book on Hamilton is very enjoyable to read and helped me learn more about the greatness and humanity of the man than I had understood before. We learn about Hamilton's foreign birth and unlikely beginnings. We follow his rise and learn about the many strengths he had. Brookhiser is sympathetic to Hamilton's merits, as I believe we should be, but he doesn't shy away from his limitations either. The author also takes on the various debates and controversies that still surround facets of Hamilton's life. The author cuts through them and shares his conclusions with us including what cannot be resolved and what the various contentions would mean if it were to hold. This book reads quickly, but deserves some mediation and consideration rather than a dash through. There are some helpful pictures, many helpful notes and an index.
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