Mercedes de Acosta, the poet who was not afraid to be

July 06, 2020 at 13:38 hrs.

 

Mercedes de Acosta (1893-1968) was a American poet that also wrote plays and designed clothes.

He rose to fame for his romantic relationships with Hollywood elite women.

Greta Garbo, Marlene Dietrich, Alla Nazimova, Tamara Karsavina, Tallulah Brankhead, Eva Le Gallienne, Isadora Duncan, Katharine Cornell, Maude Adams, Ona Munson, Adele Astaire, were some of the celebrities with whom she struck up romance.

Mercedes was the youngest daughter of eight siblings, her mother wanted a child and since she was little she treated her as such and even called her Mercedes Rafael.

This deal completely marked Mercedes who went on to state that at times she felt she was androgynous.

Mercedes de Acosta was one of the few people at the time who did not try to hide her homosexuality and although her talent in literature was enormous, her private life was the one that captured the spotlight.

Greta Garbo is said to have been the life's great love of her life.

In some of her poems, Mercedes de Acosta reflects her struggle for personal acceptance.

His most famous play jacob slovak (1923) addresses the anti-Semitism of a small New England town. 

In 1960, when De Acosta was seriously ill and needed money, he published his memoirs Here Lies the Heart, revelations that earned him the enmity of several of the people who appear in them.

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Mercedes de Acosta died at 75, forgotten and in relative poverty.

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