The hit musical “Hamilton” is the rage of the stage these days. But long before it was a glimmer in composer Lin-Manuel Miranda’s eye, a novel about Alexander Hamilton’s arch-rival captivated America’s interest. Two generations after its release, Burr by the late Gore Vidal is still sparklingly relevant and worthy of a fresh read in the age of Trump.
For those of you who didn’t pay attention in high school history, Aaron Burr was the Bad Boy of America’s Founding Fathers, a villain ranking up there with the likes of Benedict Arnold. He lost the presidency by a whisker to Thomas Jefferson, was tried for (and acquitted of) treason, and lives in infamy for dispatching 21st century theater-darling Hamilton into the hereafter with a bullet.
So why should anyone today read a work of historical fiction about such a scoundrel? Because Burr resonates as strongly in the current political climate as it did when it was first released 45 years ago.
America was mired in despair back then. We had just emerged from the nightmare of Vietnam only to find ourselves stuck in the misery of Watergate. Trust in government and important institutions (such as the presidency) plummeted daily.
At that moment, novelist Gore Vidal produced a masterpiece unlike anything that had come before.
Burr begins in the 1830s with an elderly but spry Aaron Burr deciding to tell his personal story to Charles Schermerhorn Schuyler, a young legal clerk who is bored to tears with the law and yearns to become a literary figure. So they set out together, Burr recalling his event-filled life and Charlie putting it down on paper.
Seen through Burr’s unsparing eye, the Founding Fathers come down off their marble pedestals and become flesh and blood once more. While meeting with George Washington, Burr notices the president can’t settle into a comfortable position because of a nasty carbuncle on his fanny. “Gasping with pain, he swore mightily. Aware that he was now no longer royal in my eyes, but simply a Virginia planter whose bottom hurt …”
Thomas Jefferson is portrayed as the fair-complexioned, soft-spoken, painfully shy person he really was — as well as a conniver extraordinaire who professed the highest ideals while honing the skills of a political killer.
Adams (the Elder), Madison, Monroe, John Marshall, and Andrew Jackson all grace Burr’s pages. There is even a humorous moment when Burr recalls how, as he was bowing during his one and only presentation to Napoleon Bonaparte, the French emperor passed gas.
And yes, Alexander Hamilton makes multiple appearances in Burr’s recollections. In a candor that’s pleasantly refreshing to the modern reader, Burr professes admiration for the man he killed, but also admits “…the principal difference between my friend Hamilton and me was at the crucial moment his hand shook and mine never does.”
In fact, Vidal has Burr observing that although the rivals were very much alike, the political arena of 1804 was too small to accommodate two over-sized egos that craved the presidency with equally burning desire.
If you think this is a case of Burr dumping on his contemporaries while exonerating himself, think again. Vidal’s Burr is quick to admit his own failures and acknowledge his many shortcomings, both as a political figure and as a man.
There is also a subplot that will keep you on the edge of your seat, a healthy dose of romping under the covers, and a twist ending that is so thoroughly believable you will want to kick yourself for not having seen it coming.
Vidal’s Aaron Burr is kind of an anti-hero. (They were all the rage when the novel came out in late 1973.) Having a bona fide villain paint personalized portraits of figures we have read about for years permits us to see them from a new perspective. That, in turn, provides an avenue for viewing our system of government in a new light as well. (Particularly from the viewpoint of the guys who created it from scratch.)
As I wrote earlier, Burr remains the perfect vehicle for revisiting our system in the Trump era, where Left and Right each battle against their respective establishments, where president and press squabble over “fake news,” and where the typical everyday guy or gal struggles to decide whether the individual even matters any longer.
While it’s too late to make Burr your summer beach reading, it will provide the perfect complement to this fall’s midterm election campaign.
Hopefully, nobody will be shot in a duel this time around.
J. Mark Powell (@JMarkPowell) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a former broadcast journalist and government communicator. His weekly offbeat look at our forgotten past, “Holy Cow! History,” can be read at jmarkpowell.com.
