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Mercedes de Acosta (March 1, 1892 – May 9, 1968) was an American poet, playwright, and novelist. Four of de Acosta's plays were produced, and she published a novel and three volumes of poetry. She was professionally unsuccessful but is known for her many lesbian affairs with famous Broadway and Hollywood personalities and numerous friendships with prominent artists of the period.
She was born in New York City in 1892. Her father, Ricardo de Acosta, was Cuban and of Spanish descent while her mother, Micaela Hernandez de Alba y de Alba, was Spanish and reportedly a descendant of the Spanish Dukes of Alba. De Acosta had severa
Mercedes de Acosta (March 1, 1892 – May 9, 1968) was an American poet, playwright, and novelist. Four of de Acosta's plays were produced, and she published a novel and three volumes of poetry. She was professionally unsuccessful but is known for her many lesbian affairs with famous Broadway and Hollywood personalities and numerous friendships with prominent artists of the period.
She was born in New York City in 1892. Her father, Ricardo de Acosta, was Cuban and of Spanish descent while her mother, Micaela Hernandez de Alba y de Alba, was Spanish and reportedly a descendant of the Spanish Dukes of Alba. De Acosta had several siblings: Aida, Ricardo Jr., Angela, Maria, and Rita. Maria married socially prominent A. Robeson Sargent, the Harvard-educated landscape architect and son of Charles Sprague Sargent. Rita would become a famous beauty best known as Rita Lydig. She was photographed by Adolf de Meyer, Edward Steichen, and Gertrude Käsebier, sculpted in alabaster by Malvina Hoffman, and painted by Giovanni Boldini and John Singer Sargent among others. She also wrote one novel, Tragic Mansions (Boni & Liveright, 1927), under the name Mrs Philip Lydig, a society melodrama described as "emotionally moving and appealing" by The New York Times. De Acosta attended elementary school at the Covenant of the Blessed Sacrement on West 79th Street in Manhattan where Dorothy Parker was a classmate.
De Acosta married painter Abram Poole (January 12, 1882 Chicago, Illinois – May 24, 1961) in 1920. They divorced in 1935.
De Acosta was involved in numerous lesbian relationships with Broadway’s and Hollywood's elite and did not attempt to hide her sexuality, which was rare in her generation. In 1916 she began an affair with actress Alla Nazimova and later with dancer Isadora Duncan. Shortly after marrying Abram Poole in 1920, de Acosta became involved in a five-year relationship with actress Eva Le Gallienne. The two women vacationed and traveled together often. De Acosta wrote two plays for Le Gallienne, Sandro Botticelli and Jehanne de Arc. After the financial failures of both plays they ended their relationship.
Over the next decade she had romances with several famous actresses and dancers including Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Ona Munson, and Russian ballerina Tamara Platonovna Karsavina. Additional unsubstantiated rumors include Pola Negri, Eleonora Duse, Katherine Cornell, and Alice B. Toklas.
An ardent liberal, de Acosta was committed to several political causes. Deeply concerned about the Spanish Civil War, which began in 1936, for example, she supported the loyalist Republican government that opposed Franco and fascism. She was also a tireless advocate for women's rights and wrote in her memoir, "I believed...in every form of independence for women and I was...an enrolled worker for women's suffrage.
De Acosta's best-known relationship was with Greta Garbo. In 1931, they were introduced by Garbo's friend, author Salka Viertel, and quickly became involved. Their relationship was erratic and volatile with Garbo always in control. The two were very close sporadically and then apart for lengthy periods when Garbo, annoyed by Mercedes' obsession, coupled with her own neuroses, ignored her. It is thought that de Acosta remained in love with Garbo for the rest of her life but it is doubtful that Garbo shared these feelings. In any case, they remained friends for thirty years during which time Garbo wrote de Acosta 181 letters, cards, and telegrams.
Although it has been argued that no proof of a romance between them exists, their involvement is discussed by all of Garbo's and de Acosta's recent biographers. Because she was destitute in 1959, de Acosta sold her papers to the Rosenbach Museum & Library in Philadelphia and claims to have reluctantly included the love letters she received from Garbo. "I would not have had the heart or courage to have burned these letters", she wrote William McCarthy, curator of the museum. "I mean, of course, Eva [sic], Greta's and Marlene's who were lovers.... I only hope...they will be respected and protected from the eyes of vulgar people. Per de Acosta's request, Garbo's letters were made available to the public in 2000, ten years after Garbo's death, and did not include romantic letters. Garbo's family, which controls her estate, has allowed only 87 of the letters, cards, and telegrams to be released.
In the early 1930s de Acosta developed an interest in Hinduism and was encouraged to seek out Indian mystic Meher Baba when he arrived in Hollywood. For several years she was captivated by his philosophy and methods and he often gave her advice about ways to address her problems. Later, she studied the philosophy of Hindu sage Ramana Maharishi who introduced her to yoga, meditation, and other spiritual practices she hoped would help ease her suffering. In 1938, she met Hindu dancer Ram Gopal in Hollywood. They immediately established a rapport and became close lifelong friends. Later that year they traveled to India to meet Maharishi.
When asked about religion, de Acosta once said that although she had grown up Catholic, she would be, if she had to be anything, a Buddhist.
In 1960, when de Acosta was seriously ill with a brain tumor and in need of money, she published her memoir, Here Lies the Heart. The reviews were positive and many close friends praised the book. But its allusions to homosexuality resulted in the severance of several friendships with women who felt she had betrayed their sexuality. Garbo also ended their friendship at this time. Eva Le Gallienne in particular was furious, denouncing de Acosta as a liar and stating that she invented the stories for fame. This characterization is inaccurate, however, since many of her affairs and relationships with women, including that with Le Gallienne, are confirmed in personal correspondence. In any case, she gained a reputation that was not appreciated by everyone. But as Alice B. Toklas, lover of Gertrude Stein and de Acosta's long-term friend, wrote to a disapproving critic, "Say what you will about Mercedes, she’s had the most important women of the twentieth century".
De Acosta died at age 76 in poverty. She is buried at Trinity Cemetery in Washington Heights, New York City.
De Acosta has usually been described disparagingly, dismissed as a dishonest nuisance to her lovers.[29] Garbo’s biographers, for example, assess their relationship from Garbo's perspective in which Garbo is fundamentally blameless in their difficult relationship, a perpetual victim of de Acosta's irksome behavior. But Robert A. Schanke, de Acosta's recent biographer, attempts, on the basis of extensive research, to provide an accurate picture of her. She was, Schanke acknowledges, flawed and imperfect, a complex woman who impaired several of her relationships and failed to achieve her professional and romantic aspirations. But he reveals her to have been an exceptional person who was lively, intelligent, and dynamic and who had many devoted friends. She was, he argues, a brave lesbian of her times (which caused her heartache and misery and a person of integrity who remained kind and loyal to most everyone with whom she crossed paths. He suggests that the many denigrating portrayals of her may derive from the deep homophobia of her generation.
She has been accused of fabricating incidents in her memoir and lacing it with half-truths and fantasies, an indictment that is not entirely fair since it is not unusual in autobiographies. She herself confessed, “I may have made mistakes in some dates or minor incidents but…I feel I have held to the spirit of my statement if not to the letter". Nevertheless, Karen Swenson, a Garbo biographer, and Schanke identified and corrected significant errors in de Acosta's account. While the memoir was initially unsuccessful, it was rediscovered in the late 1960s and widely read in the underground gay community. In spite of its inaccuracies, it is now recognized as an important contribution to gay and lesbian history.
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