My dearest Angelica, "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow Creeps in this petty pace from day to day" I'll trust you'll understand the reference to another Scottish tragedy without my having to name the play They think me Macbeth, ambition is my folly I'm a polymath, a pain in the arse, a massive pain Madison is Banquo, Jefferson's Macduff and Birnam Wood is Congress on its way to Dunsinane And there you are an ocean away Do you have to live an ocean away?
Since it opened in 2015, Hamilton is already one of the most successful Broadway musicals of all times. It won the Pulitzer Price for drama, 11 Tony Awards and eventually our hearts. Sounds like Shakespeare to me, doesn't it? Let's dig into that.
One of the reasons Shakespeare stands above his contemporaries is that his characters have individual voices. He defines each speaker by particular quirks — Miranda does the exact same thing with his actors or singers. Take the character of George Washington. To picture him as someone who is straightforward and solid, Miranda wrote his lines with a considerable amount of anaphoras, alliterations and isocolons.
Provoke outrage, outright Don't engage, strike by night Remain relentless till their troops take flight... Outrun Outlast Hit 'em quick, get out fast Stay alive till this horror show is past
Moreover, the out- prefix has an interesting connection to Shakespeare: “True compound verbs in out- are those in which the sense of surpassing, exceeding, or beating in some action is conveyed (…). These are being freely and boldly employed by Shakespeare, who is our earliest authority for many of them, including the curious group typified by ‘to outfrown frowns’, ‘to out-Herod Herod’. (Oxford English Dictionary)
Miranda's Angelica Schuyler, meanwile, is brilliant, but with an intense urgengy - her mind fires at a million miles an hour, and her speech patterns show it.
I remember that night, I just might Regret that night for the rest of my days
I remember those soldier boys
trippin' over themselves to win our praise I remember that dreamlike candlelight like a dream that you can't quite place But Alexander, I'll never forget the first
time I saw your face I have never been the same Intelligent eyes in a hunger-pang frame And when you said "hi" I forgot my dang name Set my heart aflame, every part aflame This is not a game
There’s anaphora, mesodiplosis, chiasmus, alliterations, epistrophes and an antithesis between the past and present tense in the verbs she uses. What you get is this bobbing effect, in and out of reality, in and out of memory.
Miranda also uses these rhetorical differences to help the actors playing different characters in each act (Marquis de Lafayette/Thomas Jefferson, Hercules Mulligan/James Madison, John Laurens/Philip Hamilton, Peggy Schuyler/Maria Reynolds) — just like Shakespeare used to do in his plays.
But what do The Tempest and Hamilton have in common?
· Both Hamilton and Prospero are manipulative characters and use their abilities and skills (rhetoric art and magic spells) unorthodoxly. · British Colonialism and slavery is a key concept in both plays. By putting Caliban under slavery and undermining him as a monster, we can take Prospero as a representative of the Europeans who usurped the land of native Americans and enslaved them. The Tempest shows the colonizer's attitude of looking down on the colonized people. Caliban is seen as a despicable entity. “This thing of darkness, I call my own” Although Caliban does not behave. His hatred towards the colonizer is strong, he’s disobedient and always claims that the land is to be inherited on him. “This island is mine, by Sycorax, my mother.” Hamilton’s characters (“a bunch of revolutionaries manumission abolitionists”) also want to strike back on the colonizer, and they misbehave, they organize a revolution, they emerge against British domination.
A civics lesson from a slaver Hey, neighbour, your debts are paid 'cause you don't pay for labour "We plant seeds in the ground, we create" Yeah, keep ranting, we know who's really doing the planting!
· Revenge, repentance and forgiveness are also key concepts in both plays. Lots of characters have moments where they feel guilty or wish to reverse their actions, and this results in other characters wanting to seek revenge (Prospero was betrayed by Antonio, just like Burr was betrayed by Hamilton, and so on).
Both plays witness the same kinds of love: parent to child, man to his birthplace, woman to man (both love and lust), brother to brother, master to slave, courtier to king. Prospero and Alexander initially take a clinical approach to their love based on their usefulness to them (Prospero shows way more affection to Ariel than to Caliban because the spirit's more useful, while Alexander approaches Eliza so he can marry her to elevate his status and leaves Angelica heartbroken despite their mutual attraction), meanwhile their love for their children has been forced into a strong emotional closeness.
Oh, Philip you outshine the morning sun My son Look at my son Pride is not the word I'm looking for
There is so much more
It could also be argued that Miranda and Ferdinand are examples of both romantic and lustful love. They fall in love at first sight, and although Ferdinand's initial description of Miranda is not sexual, the first question he asks is "if [she] be maid or no". While in this context "maid" means human, the audience would also be aware of the meaning as an unmarried, virgin woman. In Hamilton, both of the Schuyler sisters fall in love with Alexander at first sight, and while Alexander looks (and probably is) actually committed to Eliza's love, and willing to marry her as soon as possible, he's also looking for power and lust.
Although the most genuine and passionate love depicted is probably Caliban and Alexander's love for their land. [endif]
This is not a moment, it's the movement Where all the hungriest brothers with something to prove went? Foes oppose us, we take an honest stand We roll like Moses, claming our promised land And if we win our independence? Is that a guarantee of freedom for our descendants? Or will the blood be shed begin an endless cycle of vengeance and death with no defendants? I know the action in the street is exciting but Jesus, between all the bleeding and fighting I've been reading and writing We need to handle our financial situation Are we a nation of states? What's the state of our nation?
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