All rise! Lin-Manuel Miranda tells his story

How does a young, scrappy and hungry actor and composer of Puerto Rican heritage grow up to not only reinvent hip hop and musical theatre but also reimagine history at the same time? That’s what Lin-Manuel Miranda did with Hamilton and he tells us all about it in a special Letter To My Younger Self, ahead of his appearance in the BBC’s adaptation of His Dark Materials.

Keeping with the Hamilton theme, we travel to the tiny Caribbean island where the real Alexander Hamilton was born. Despite its most famous son having revolutionised global finances, the ex-British colony of Nevis now makes its living by rinsing the dirty money of crooks around the world.

And Olivia Bridge of the Immigration Advice Service writes about the futile, destructive and expensive deterrents designed to make life difficult for immigrants coming up from the bottom to start a new life.

Also inside…

• We announce the winner of the Big Issue’s Crime Writing Competition. Hundreds of people sent in a chapter and the standard was so high that it was difficult to narrow down the prime suspects who’d make the shortlist. Find out WHOWUNNIT!
• One contest finishes and another begins – yes, it’s the most wonderful time of the year when we launch our now traditional Kids Cover Competition! We’re already looking forward to the office getting covered in glitter once again. Spread the word if you know any budding young artists…
• Did the Joker film not dig far enough into Batman’s backstory? Well, the good news is they’ve made a TV show,Pennyworth, about butler Alfred’s younger days. We speak to the star who’s treating the show like an audition for 007. Plus we find out from Shaun the Sheep how he trained for his extra-terrestrial exploits in Farmageddon.
• This week’s My Pitch vendor is Gheorghe Dumitru
• Plus: Were Britons happiest in the Victorian era?

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