Shirer was an American journalist in the world of the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s, who happened to be in the right place at the right time - first with Gandhi, then with Hitler and his murderous gang and then in San Francisco, where the UN was being born. After the devilish inspired Berlin Diary, Death of Berlin Diary and The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich - well, I can almost see Shirer thinking "what now?"

A result was this book in the 1970s - documenting his journey to India and to Gandhi, some 50 years previously. As usual, Shirer is on form doing what he does best - telling what he saw and did with the great man and saying what Shirer thought, both in the 1920s and 1970s. Shirer's genius is the grounding of greatness of man in the particular mundane details. The image for me of Shirer's Gandhi? - a coughing old man, dressed in home-spun cloth, walking miles in Simla to meet the Viceroy - with the steely purpose of freeing India! Awe-inspiring. ( )