Stardom? I'd rather be an insignificant speck, claims Keira

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She made her screen debut at 14 and, 21 films later, commands an estimated £3million per movie.

But now Keira Knightley says she has had enough.

The 22-year-old actress has complained that fame has robbed her of an ordinary life.

She says she wants to "give it up altogether" and "do something else", hinting that she would like children.

Her decision was prompted by a recent trekking holiday in the Himalayas where, she told a magazine interviewer, she got to feel like an "insignificant speck".

"I spent ten days in a place where no one knew me or cared what films I'd been in.

"I got to have some total peace and balance and see myself as a tiny, insignificant speck - something I really needed," said the Pirates Of The Caribbean star.

"The celebrity thing is completely crazy. I think I just have to move away or give it up altogether."

Keira Knightley: The Pirates of the Caribbean star said she won't continue to act when she has a family

Miss Knightley, who has been dating fellow actor Rupert Friend for 17 months, added in the interview for the May issue of Elle: "I couldn't have kids in the situation I'm in now. But I could just do something else.

"That's probably what's going to happen. I'm just not so hungry any more. I made a decision very recently that I wanted a life instead."

Miss Knightley, who asked her parents to find her an agent when she was three, appeared in her first movie in 1999 - as the "decoy queen" to Natalie Portman's Amidala in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

She made her breakthrough three years later playing a tomboy footballer in Bend It Like Beckham.

This is not the first time the actress has complained about the downsides of fame.

In an interview on New Zealand TV last month she launched a scathing attack on the way Britain treats celebrities, saying: "It's all pretty difficult to deal with. I am an actress.

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Keira with boyfriend and actor Rupert Friend as the couple attempt to live a low-key life despite Keira's worldwide fame

"I don't see myself as a celebrity. The whole celebrity thing seems to be a job that you find yourself in and you haven't actually signed up for it, and I don't actually agree with that."

Despite her latest complaints, Miss Knightley is likely to be in the public eye for a while longer.

She has two films - Silk and Atonement - awaiting release in the autumn and she is due to start filming The Best Time Of Our Lives alongside Lindsay Lohan next month.