Granted complete access to Olivier's papers by his family, Derek Granger provides here an intimate portrait of the greatest actor of the English speaking world in the 20th century. Olivier is a gift to any biographer. Even more of a gift to the official biographer is the fact that Olivier was a hoarder. He kept old driving licences, travel tickets, doctor's prescriptions, notes on make-up - but more important all the letters he received and carbon copies of almost everything he sent. He also kept a wartime diary which has never been seen. All this and much more has been held in a barn on the family estate in Sussex. It is, says Granger, "an incredible archive of immense historic, cultural and human - not to mention financial - value and it is from such detail that biography comes to life" Granger has also been allowed into the archives of other key players in Olivier's life. The state of Vivien Leigh, his second wife, gave him the unpublished and previously unseen letters from Olivier before they married. John Gielgud also agreed to give the Olivier material which he possesses and which until now, he has withheld.