You are asking 2 questions. Dave answered one part of it, 32000 characters
can be entered in a cell BUT only 1024 will display, now that can be
overcome by using a lot of alt + enters but how much it can be overcome I
don't know.. If by any chance I would need to put a large piece of text in
Excel I use a text box
Data and page fields in a pivot table is 256 characters
row and column fields limited by available memory
if you use help and type "specifications" you can see for yourself