Mercedes de Acosta - Legacy

Legacy

De Acosta has usually been described disparagingly, dismissed as a dishonest nuisance to her lovers. 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.