"Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Tells Your Story"
Lyrics with Character Names: Total Words: 512, Words Counted Once: 189
Most common Words: "Eliza" (33 times), "Company" (19 times), "Story" (19 times)
Lyrics without Character Names: Total Words: 424, Words Counted Once: 181
Most Common Words: "Story" (19 times), "Time" (13 times), "Tells" (10 times)
Hamilton may be gone, but "time" moves forward. Eliza takes over the narrator position from Burr as she explains Hamilton's desire to create a legacy. She explains how she reconnected with the people he worked with in the past and continued to advocate for change in society. The musical ends with the entire "company" posing the question to the audience "Who lives? Who dies? Who Tells Your Story".
This closing number encompasses the theme of legacy and if a person can truly be happy with the legacy. In the end after a person is gone, it is up to the people left to continue to tell what happened as time moves forward. It is a question that is not often posed in society, but it is completely valid. Everyone has their own agenda they are living to better themselves, including Hamilton and Burr, but it becomes Eliza's legacy and job to tell the "story" of what her husband did (good and bad).
As audience members continue to watch or the average person decides to listen to the Hamilton cast recording, they keep going back to it in order to understand every subtle detail. This story is told through the crazy word combinations, mixed with talented actors, and unexpected rap music. There are so many elements to be curious about, but the use of language to tell the story of a man whose job revolved heavily with the words and writings, shows the importance of words in history all the way until today. For it is the words of this show that makes it so famous and well loved. So as I close my final entry in this project, I can leave it knowing I have created my own minuscule piece of history. Much like Hamilton, I wrote this like I was running out of time, so although I lost many hours of sleep researching and blasting these songs at full volume. I have analyzed a historical musical and I am a happy musical theatre English nerd. This is the story I created.
"I'll see you on the other side. Till we meet again"
Thank you for your time.
Yours truely,
N. Meyers
Back to Coggle Hamilton character mind map: https://coggle.it/diagram/WNMHd-Ej5QAB6iqC