Editing Greta Garbo (section)

== Early life and education ==
Greta Lovisa Gustafsson<ref name="LCSN-19401104">{{Cite news |title=Asks Citizenship |url=https://newspapers.com/image/28410898/ |newspaper=[[Las Cruces Sun-News]] |date=4 November 1940 |access-date=21 April 2020 |via=[[Newspapers.com]] |page=3 |volume=60 |number=181 |archive-date=1 August 2020 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200801090543/https://newspapers.com/image/28410898/ |url-status=live }}</ref> was born in [[Södermalm]], [[Stockholm]], Sweden at 7:30&nbsp;pm.<ref name="Greta Garbo: A Divine Star">{{Cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=soO1AwAAQBAJ&q=1905&pg=PT113 |title=Greta Garbo: A Divine Star |isbn=978-1-84954-353-8 |last1=Bret |first1=David |date= 2012 |publisher=Biteback |access-date=11 December 2020 |archive-date=3 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240403150357/https://books.google.com/books?id=soO1AwAAQBAJ&q=1905&pg=PT113#v=snippet&q=1905&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref> She was the third, and youngest, child of Anna Lovisa (née Karlsson, 1872–1944), who worked at a jam factory, and Karl Alfred Gustafsson (1871–1920), a laborer.<ref name="WareBraukman2004p227-228" /><ref name="Sjolander1971p12-13" /> She had an older brother, Sven Alfred (1898–1967), and an older sister, Alva Maria (1903–1926).<ref name="Furhammar1991p129" /> Garbo was nicknamed Kata, which was how she had mispronounced her first name, for the first ten years of her life.<ref name="Greta Garbo: A Divine Star" />

Her parents met in Stockholm, where her father had been visiting from [[Frinnaryd]]. He moved to Stockholm to become independent and worked as a street cleaner, grocer, factory worker and butcher's assistant.{{sfn|Souhami|1994|p=64}} He married Anna, who moved from [[Högsby]].<ref>[http://carina.stridlund.se/hellbomwebb/pcf361e2e.html "Karl Alfred Gustafsson"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120420061300/http://carina.stridlund.se/hellbomwebb/pcf361e2e.html |date=20 April 2012 }}. Retrieved 7 December 2010.</ref>{{sfn|Bainbridge|1955b|p=76}} The family was impoverished and lived in a three-bedroom cold-water flat at Blekingegatan No. 32. They raised their three children in a working-class district regarded as the city's slum.<ref name="DAmico1962p901" /> Garbo later recalled:

{{blockquote|It was eternally grey—those long winter's nights. My father would be sitting in a corner, scribbling figures on a newspaper. On the other side of the room, my mother is repairing ragged old clothes, sighing. We children would be talking in very low voices, or just sitting silently. We were filled with anxiety, as if there were danger in the air. Such evenings are unforgettable for a sensitive girl, but also for a girl like me. Where we lived, all the houses and apartments looked alike, their ugliness matched by everything surrounding us.<ref name="Lektyr1931" />}}
Garbo was a shy daydreamer as a child.<ref name="Corporation1974">{{Cite book |title=Liberty |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vQYAAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA57 |access-date=4 August 2010 |year=1974 |publisher=Liberty Library Corporation |pages=27–31 & 54–57}}{{dead link|date=August 2011}}</ref> She disliked school<ref name="Biery1928a-hatesc" /><ref>{{Cite magazine |magazine=[[Life (magazine)|Life]] |date=8 November 1937 |title=After Twelve Years Greta Garbo Wants to Go Home to Sweden |page=81 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kD8EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA81 |access-date=4 August 2011 |archive-date=3 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240403150354/https://books.google.com/books?id=kD8EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA81#v=onepage&q&f=false |url-status=live }}</ref> and preferred to play alone.<ref name="Biery1928a-noplay" /> She was a natural leader{{sfn|Swenson|1997|p=25}} who became interested in theatre at an early age.<ref name="Biery1928a-sixorseven" /> She directed her friends in make-believe games and performances,{{sfn|Swenson|1997|p=26}} and dreamed of becoming an actress.<ref name="Biery1928a-sixorseven" /><ref name="Biery1928a-dreaming" /> Later, she would participate in amateur theatre with her friends and frequent the [[Mosebacke]] Theatre.<ref name="Lacouture1999">{{Cite book |author=Jean Lacouture |title=Greta Garbo: La Dame aux Caméras |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=09EaAQAAIAAJ |access-date=6 August 2010 |year=1999 |publisher=Liana Levi |location=Paris |language=fr |isbn=978-2-86746-214-6 |page=22 |archive-date=3 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240403150321/https://books.google.com/books?id=09EaAQAAIAAJ |url-status=live }}</ref> At the age of 13, Garbo graduated from school,<ref>{{Cite book |author=Robert Payne |title=The Great Garbo |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_cxZAAAAMAAJ |access-date=4 August 2010 |date=November 1976 |publisher=W. H. Allen |location=London |isbn=978-0-491-01538-7 |page=22 |quote=In June 1919, she left school, and never returned. |archive-date=3 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240403150214/https://books.google.com/books?id=_cxZAAAAMAAJ |url-status=live }}</ref> and, typical of a Swedish working-class girl at that time, she did not attend high school. She later acknowledged a resulting [[inferiority complex]].{{sfn|Swenson|1997|p=32}}
[[File:Approved application for Greta Gustafsson to change her name to Greta Garbo.jpg|thumb|right|alt=Hand-written letter with multiple signatures and with stamps of approval.|The approved application by Greta's mother to allow her name change from Gustafsson to Garbo.]]
The [[1918 flu pandemic|Spanish flu]] spread throughout Stockholm in the winter of 1919 and her father, to whom she was very close, became ill and lost his job.<ref name="Parish2007">{{Cite book |first=James Robert |last=Parish |title=The Hollywood Book of Extravagance: The Totally Infamous, Mostly Disastrous, and Always Compelling Excesses of America's Film and TV Idols |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=CJS5RL7eqdsC&pg=PA76 |access-date=4 August 2010 |date= 2007 |publisher=John Wiley and Sons |location=Hoboken, NJ |isbn=978-0-470-05205-1 |page=76 |archive-date=3 April 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240403150205/https://books.google.com/books?id=CJS5RL7eqdsC&pg=PA76 |url-status=live }}</ref> Garbo cared for him, taking him to the hospital for weekly treatments. He died in 1920 when she was 14 years old.{{sfn|Bainbridge|1955b|p=76}}{{sfn|NYTimes|1990}}