Cleared for Take Off

Dirk Bogarde's most recent memoir recalls the wartime years when he served as a captain in photographic intelligence, and the postwar period when he first embarked on his film career, along with vignettes of his experiences in Hollywood, Italy, Provence and finally his return to England. There are recollections of the horrors and terror of enemy attack, the bitter ironical humour of the battlefield, despair and hopelesnes, and more palatable terror of stage-fright for a young actor "arriving" at the movies.