A classic six-volume memoir of the twentieth century, spanning through the Second World War, the Golden Age of Hollywood and the reign of Queen Elizabeth II. Sir Cecil Beaton (1904 –1980) was an English fashion, portrait and war photographer, painter, diarist and Academy Award–winning stage and costume designer.For almost as long as he could write, Cecil Beaton kept his diaries. They accumulated year after year, and from a formidable pile of notebooks he extracted enough to fill six volumes.This first volume covers seventeen years from 1922 to 1939 and is a fascinating and disarming book.He describes his friendships with famous men and women, artists, writers, actors, film stars and celebrated socialites. Few franker autobiographical documents have seen the light of day.