She had the world -- well, certainly New York -- at her feet. Her movie debut ( ‘I will make you a star,' Italian movie tycoon Dino De Laurentiis told her with a straight face) in ‘Lipstick' was a huge flop. She was jealous of her sister's success in the film and they grew apart. She began drinking heavily but said:' I drank to loosen up. I never thought that alcohol would become a problem. In my grandfather's time it was a virtue to be able to drink a lot and never show it. And like him I wanted to live my life to the fullest and with gusto. I always thought alcohol would give me the strength and courage to do whatever I wanted to do. In fact, it made me less able to think clearly. ‘I never got heavily into drugs. I didn't like smoking pot. I tried to coke but I never got caught up with it. I have epilepsy and deep down I had the feeling that certain drugs were not good for me because they could trigger seizures. I learned later that alcohol was just as dangerous but at the time I told myself it wouldn't hurt.' She wasn't hurting in 1983 when I arranged to interview her in New York . We were to meet on a Wednesday lunchtime at the Russian Tea Room. She turned up on Tuesday -- and waited. When the celebrity restaurant closed at 2am she went to the Plaza and returned at the correct time on Wednesday. She drank champagne like beer. Lunch ended around 6pm . It seemed very Hemingway. Sadly, finally, it was. Later, in 1988 she said:' For a time I was living the life of Ernest Hemingway. I think alcohol drove my grandfather to suicide but I'm still alive because I did something about it. ‘ She joined Liza Minelli and others as a victim of overindulgence at Studio 54 and followed a string of famous faces like Elizabeth Taylor, Minelli, Tony Curtis and Robert Mitchum to the Betty Ford Centre. She was no longer the sleek country girl with snow on her boots. Booze had puffed out her face and swelled her body. At the centre she lost more than her drinking habit. She dropped more than two stone in weight. Her parents -- her mother Byra died in 1988 from cancer -- had paid for her treatment and she said it worked:' I was brought up as a cowboy girl. I was always involved in outdoor activities -- now that's all I want.' During her time at the rehabilitation centre her cousin Lorian Hemingway was undergoing similar treatment. ‘By a very conservative count more than 75 percent of my family has been alcoholic,' said Lorian adding:' This alcoholism passed along with the passion to write and the will to survive that passion, is as clearly a heritage to me as are my dark eyes.' Margaux Hemingway appeared to have out raced her heritage. She had completed the narration for a nature television series, ‘The Wild Guide', and was planning other animal programmes. However, there were some strange signs. She had moved into the apartment where her body was discovered only two weeks ago. Her agent David Mirisch was quoted last night (Tuesday) as saying she had recently been unhappy. He said:' She hasn't really been the Margaux Hemingway we all knew as far as having that ‘'up'' personality.' Of course, did anybody really know her. Ernest Hemingway's stoic motto was ‘ Il faut (d'abord) durer' -- ‘One must, above all, endure.' He couldn't and arguably that is his family's legacy.
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