Reddit reviews Hat Box: The Collected Lyrics of Stephen Sondheim: A Box Set

If you love Sondheim I highly recommend his Finishing the Hat/Look, I made a Hat. These two books contain lyrics from all his shows, annotated with anecdotes and insightful observations written by Sondheim himself.

Other musicals also have books that trace the whole development process and provide a behind-the-scene look of the show, such as Hamilton: A Revolution, The Great Comet: The Journey of a New Musical to Broadway and Wicked: The Grimmerie

Sondheim, maybe the greatest living lyricist, always has a dictionary, thesaurus, and rhyming dictionary when he writes.

And he's written books on his process

I would suggest reading Sondheim's books.

Finishing the Hat, and Look, I Made a Hat

And Everything Was Possible

Both are gonna give you very indepth details in the making of a musical, though specific to Sondheim.

From what I remember, the Lyricist and the Bookwriter went over the outline together. Then the bookwriter would start writing the play and send scenes as they were done. The lyricist/Score writers would then use those scenes as inspiration for songs.

I've been eyeing this off for some time because it looks amazing, maybe this is the right occasion to say "fuck it" and reward myself :)

That said, a dance off could work too.