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Many consider it the most memorable introduction in film history – while he stands without moving a muscle.

A young FBI agent, just starting out, navigates a corridor of cells arriving at Hannibal Lecter's transparent prison. The man is present, his face resembling an animated death's head exuding demonic evil, unnervingly still wearing a snug prisoner's blue outfit. He remains motionless before suddenly he propels himself against the glass, producing that distinctive snarling-hissing noise. Countless true-crime documentaries have since demonstrated that real-life murderers are usually uninteresting, lacking anything like the actor's powerful on-screen charisma.

Hopkins was hardly a newcomer upon receiving his Academy Award-winning part in The Silence of the Lambs in 1989: a star wasn't born, instead, a superstar emerged. His portrayal of Lecter was inspired, Hopkins notes with amusement in his latest book, on the classic Dracula, on the Soviet leader based on his daughter's accounts, and also from his rigorously precise acting coach Christopher Fettes. Additionally, there existed a father-daughter dimension within the narrative; a painful subject for Hopkins, who also describes how his King Lear was subconsciously influenced by painful regret regarding his daughter Abigail, the daughter he was separated from from his initial marriage during the 60s with Petronella Barker, who resented him being away and drinking.

The title originates from an old wartime photo of Hopkins as a toddler on the beach with his dad – the child who might have felt he wouldn't succeed. He was a bewildered, shy and fragile youth hailing from Port Talbot, his father was Richard Arthur Hopkins, the standout secondary character here: a pastry chef and a traditional male, a plain speaker who detested the Bible-punching hypocrites of the chapel and didn't believe in showing his emotions, but had a streak of dreamy, sentimental tenderness. His father who furiously resented how they were forced cap-in-hand to their rich relatives including Auntie Patty, whose husband knew the famous Bevan and could get Anthony as a boy into an elite school: “Due to their immense riches!” he exclaims during the car ride. “Everyone is looking for scraps! Bloody rubbish, that's what it is!”

The humility worked, temporarily. Hopkins was a hopeless student at the prestigious school. However, one day in an English lesson he was required to perform John Masefield's poem known as The West Wind – without prior preparation – and his talent emerged; he amazed the instructor and the other students. He convincingly states that poetry, on its own, started his career. This, and joining the YMCA theater group. Remarkably, he left school with low prospects, pursued acting, and shocking his family, was performing alongside Laurence Olivier at the famous theater in just ten years. He largely achieved it alone, although in those days financial aid was available to go to Rada – a path to success for working-class actors. His father was always amazed with Anthony's worldwide acclaim: when he asked Anthony to deliver the Yorick lines from Hamlet, Hopkins Sr listened attentively and then left the room and wept openly.

Concerning the volatile, stubborn individual, he departed the theatrical troupe out of frustration – much to Olivier's disappointment and disapproval – but stumbled upon a memorable TV character playing an alleged war criminal in the series QB VII, which led indirectly to parts like that in Lynch's The Elephant Man and a luminous film journey on screen, which he preferred over theater. And he quit booze back in 1975 having been a hell-raising alcoholic, and thus made it through midlife to execute great performances, such as Lecter, the steward Stevens in the movie with Emma Thompson with Emma Thompson and the elderly man with dementia in his film The Father – his next Oscar win.

During the second part of his autobiography he appears more reserved, more deliberate. A few tales fall a bit flat. He recalls being taken out to lunch alongside his cast mate in the film Nixon, the much-respected actor Sorvino, who sought to advise him his performance as Nixon was falling short. Was this the moment for Hopkins to learn something from the legendary star of the Goodfellas fame? Not really. Hopkins seems to go along with the director's criticism of Sorvino as being motivated out of envy. Is that so?

He often portrays the grounded, serious thespian who thinks it's your duty to be on time, remember every crew member's name and get on with it. Quite so. But he also recounts standing up to an unpleasant filmmaker who'd made a young extra cry: “Apologise to her! And learn some manners. Should you ever act that way in front of me, I'll change the shape of your face! Hopkins sounds like an individual who stopped drinking yet perhaps not the aggression that went with it. A classical performer like Hopkins is aware of Cornwall's speech regarding Kent in King Lear: “He cannot flatter, he! An honest mind and plain – he must speak truth!”

He finishes his autobiography with a detailed supplement composed simply