Mercedes de Acosta: The poet who had affairs with the 20th century’s most famous women

Mercedes de Acosta wrote the newly discovered volume for a set designer who staged many of Noël Coward’s plays. Photograph: ullstein bild Dtl./ullstein bild/Getty Images

She was the “furious lesbian” who had affairs with some of the most famous women of the jazz age, prompting the writer and wit Alice B Toklas to remark of Mercedes de Acosta: “Say what you will about Mercedes, she’s had the most important women of the 20th century.”

Among the playwright and poet’s conquests and flirtations were Hollywood royalty Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich, dancers Isadora Duncan and Tamara Karsavina, actresses Ona Munson and Pola Negri, and reportedly Toklas herself.