John Gielgud appeared in hundreds of theatrical productions and films as well. He was a gifted actor in both drama and comedy. He was one of few people who had won an Emmy, a Grammy an Oscar and a Tony Award. He was knighted in 1953. He was nominated for Best Supporting Actor in 1964 for Becket and in 1981 was an Oscar winner for Best Supporting Actor in Arthur and the winner of BAFTA awards as Best British Actor. The book, John Gielgud, by Sheridan Morley, captures this remarkable man’s life in an interesting way. Arthur John Gielgud died in May of 2000 in his nineties (1904- 2000).

Some of the random notes I made while reading the book include advice from his father early in his career about his role as Hamlet:

"I do think you are speaking too fast, still, and sometimes we lose some of the words…Your quiet moments are very moving, and your mother was in tears by the end…."

His mother’s letter, written at the same time as his father’s said, in part:

"You can dominate the stage, but you never step out of the canvas to distort the picture. You do not demand the center of the stage but can hold your audience spellbound by a whisper, and their eyes with a gesture…"

Gielgud was a student of acting. He often spoke of the sound of words. He said of Shakespeare:

"I began to trust the sweep of Shakespeare’s verse, concentrating at last on the commas, full stops and semicolons. I found that if I kept to them, and breathed with them, like an inexperienced swimmer, the verse seemed to hold me up, and even, at last, to disclose its meaning."

He had a wonderful sense of humor. In a letter to his mother he described having lunch with an older woman who was a family friend. "

Yesterday I had lunch with Mrs Pat, who is, I fear now very mad, living in Hollywood most of the time but grand and majestic as ever, and of course, quarreling with everyone as usual. Aleck Woollcott told me that she was like a sinking ship, firing on all her rescuers…"

Once, attending a dinner party, the actor John Mortimer, and his wife brought their newborn son along. Gielgud, peering into the carry on the baby was in, asked "Why on earth would you bring it with you? Are you afraid of burglars at home?"

I was amused by the comment of one critic of a play he was in, who wrote about the play "There is even less to this than meets the eye." On the other hand, Lee Strasberg, the d director of New York’s Actors’ Studio once said: "When Gielgud speaks a line, you can hear Shakespeare thinking."

The book’s fitting farewell to Gielgud was from the lines of Chekov’s Swan Song:

"Our song is sung, our race is run. What talent do I have? I’m a squeezed lemon, a melting icicle, a rusty nail…an old theater rat…off we go, then."