Mario Vargas Llosa was elected to the French Academy last November 25.
The French Academy is an institution which was founded in 1634 and formalized in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, whose mission is to contribute to the improvement, the influence of letters, to give certain rules to the French language and to make it pure, eloquent and able to deal with the arts and sciences. It is made up of forty members, a select group known as "the immortals", who are elected by their peers.
The winner of the 2010 Nobel Prize for Literature obtained in the first round 18 votes, against one for the director Frédéric Vignale, one white and two draws, the Academy said in a press release. Llosa is the first and the only person who joined the Académie Française without having written books in French, and surpassed the age required by this precious institution.
Mario Vargas Llosa work translated into French, mainly by Gallimard editions, is abundant, from “La Ville et les Chiens” in 1966, to “Temps sauvage” in 2021. He was the first foreign writer to enter in life the prestigious collection of the Pléiade, in 2016.