For someone who cared so much about her outward persona, it seems that infamous con artist Anna Delvey has now turned inward. In some of her first public appearances since her notorious conviction, she donned large, black sunglasses, which reflected the sheen of camera flashes. Her refusal to let the public deter her is indisputable. During an interview with the Harvard Independent, Delvey was excellent at keeping true to her mantras and evading questions about American class and society.
Anna Delvey, born Anna Sorokin, was released from jail in October 2022 after scamming more than $275,000 out of banks, hotels, and many wealthy members of New York high society. The intrigue and controversy around her persona has brought her notoriety, from tabloid headlines, a Netflix docuseries, and even being the subject of university academia.
Three professors at Harvard University have used Anna Delvey’s story as an edifying example of personal transformation and sociological theory. These professors particularly propose the concept of changing the self to embody the cultural tastes of others which, in Delvey’s case, was the New York City elite upper-class.
In the General Education course Act Natural, Professor David Levin uses Delvey as an example of someone who pushes past the ethical limits of method acting.
Delvey strongly denied these notions of embodiment, maintaining, “it was just creation of the media.” She said, “it’s really funny what people interpret into my story because I never tried to do any such thing.”
As a master of transformation, Anna Delvey was also studied in the Expository Writing course, The Art of the Con, taught by Dr. Ian Shank. Interested in the many personalities college students try on and discard, he claims Ms. Delvey’s story, “speaks well to just how hard it is to hold onto your values while also striving to become the best version of yourself that you can.” However, Delvey claims to be still striving towards the best version of herself. She said, “I don’t know, I’m always trying to be the best version of myself…It’s really hard to dissect myself all the time…The way you are just depends on what you are facing in life.”
As part of her sentence, Delvey is not allowed to have any social media presence. “It is outside of my control. I try to focus on things I can control and not think about things I can’t,” said Delvey. She claimed to not be concerned with portrayals and interpretations of her story.
In fact, she chose not to watch the Netflix docuseries Inventing Anna. “I don’t have the time. I don’t really have the interest to watch it,” said Delvey. “It’s a dramatized version of real life events. It’s not up to me to sit here and go piece by piece and tell people what is right and what is invented.”
Traveling to New York City in 2013 with the goal of creating an art foundation for everyone, Delvey quickly started to raise money to realize her dream, the “Anna Delvey Foundation.” In order to do so, she reinvented herself as Anna Delvey, a German heiress to the fortune of an oil tycoon. She hosted extravagant parties throughout the city, invited prominent people, wore designer clothing, and scammed over $275,000 in order to appeal to her base and build funding. Six years later, the lies caught up to her; she was sentenced to jail in 2019 for grand larceny and theft.
Nowadays, Delvey seems to be focused on herself. After being released from jail in early October, she has been on house arrest in the East Village. Only occasionally granting press interviews, she denied being concerned with her image or public persona, in stark contrast to the choices that initially caused her arrest.
Instead, she is laser-focused on working on her next projects. For the first six weeks of house arrest, Delvey told us, “I have been doing mostly meetings trying to get organized. In December, I spent my time trying to figure out what I am going to do next.” In the works are designs for her own merchandise and podcast.
Delvey is particularly interested in reclaiming her narrative. On creating a podcast, she explained, “The positions have been flipped, where I’m trying not to talk about myself to like 20 different people which I don’t want.” Instead of journalists guiding Ms. Delvey’s narrative in press interviews, she can guide her own narrative in a podcast.
Keeping well to her goals, she also seemed to be unconcerned with how Harvard portrays her story. Anna Delvey was presented as a case study in Pop Culture and Contemporary Social Theory, taught by Dr. Shai Dromi, to illustrate the idea of the autodidact. As theorized by the French sociologist, Pierre Bourdieu, the autodidact attempts to learn and embody the cultural tastes of the upper class, but will forever be distinguished from those who were born with a silver spoon.
Delvey, unsurprisingly, resoundingly rejects the label of the autodidact. When asked about her attempts to conform to and transform into the culture of New York elite society, she responded with a steely edge. “I don’t even know what New York upper society means. I would not even be able to tell you one person. I was just trying to work on my project, and that’s pretty much it,” she said.
Nevertheless, Delvey also recognized that class and social barriers prevented her from realizing her dreams a decade ago. She admitted that the Anna Delvey Foundation struggled financially. Refusing to elaborate more, she frankly responded, “It’s pretty evident … financing was an issue.” Concurrently, Delvey admitted that the success of her art foundation relied on rich clientele: “It was just like an art foundation…. We had to find a way to monetize it, so everything else was just an extra … I never wanted a fucking private club, like who cares?” It is undeniable that the iron cloak of class and social exclusivity stained her past work.
Although much of Anna Delvey’s persona has been hyper-analyzed by the public, she refuses to let them break her. Instead, Delvey chooses to face inward, reckoning with and reclaiming her past. Perhaps the next class that features Anna Delvey will highlight her uncanny ability to bounce back so quickly after hardships.
Eliza Kimball ’25 (elizakimball@college.harvard.edu) is planning on taking Act Natural next semester.
David Li ’25 (davidli@college.harvard.edu) is looking for an invite to Anna Delvey’s next house party.