Swedish Academy Totally Explained

Everything about The Swedish Academy totally explained

The Swedish Academy, founded in 1786 by King Gustav III, is one of the Royal Academies of Sweden. Modelled after the Académie française, it has 18 members. The motto of the Academy is "Talent and Taste" ("Snille och Smak" in Swedish). The primary purpose of the Academy is to further the "purity, strength, and sublimity of the Swedish language" ("Svenska Språkets renhet, styrka och höghet") (Walshe, 1965). To that end the Academy publishes two dictionaries.
   The first is a one-volume dictionary called Svenska Akademiens Ordlista (SAOL). The second is a multi-volume dictionary, edited on principles similar to those of the Oxford English Dictionary, entitled Svenska Akademiens Ordbok (SAOB). The SAOL has reached its 13th edition while the first volume of the SAOB was published in 1898 and today (2005) work has progressed to words beginning with the letter "T".
   The current permanent secretary of the Academy is Horace Engdahl, who was preceded by Sture Allén. Since 1901 the Academy has annually decided who will be the laureate for the Nobel Prize in Literature, awarded in memory of the donor Alfred Nobel.
   The building now known as the Stockholm Stock Exchange Building was built for the bourgeoisie. The bottom floor was used as a trading exchange (this later became the stock exchange) and the upper floor was used for balls, new years eve parties etc. When the academy was founded, the ballroom was the biggest room in Stockholm that could be heated and thus used in the winter, so the king asked if he could borrow it. The academy has had its annual meeting there every year since, but it wasn't until 1914 the academy gained the right to use the upper floor as their own for all eternity. It is here that the Academy meets and, amongst other business, announces the names of Nobel Prize laureates. The latter makes it arguably one of the most influential literary bodies in the world.

Current members

The current members of the Swedish Academy listed by seat number :

Seat	ember of the Academy	orn	lect.	otes
1.	Sten Rudholm	1918	1977
2.	Bo Ralph	1945	1999
3.	Sture Allén	1928	1980	Permanent secretary 1986-1999
4.	Anders Olsson	1949	2008	To be introduced on December 20 2008
5.	Göran Malmqvist	1924	1985
6.	Birgitta Trotzig	1929	1993
7.	Knut Ahnlund	1923	1983	Inactive
8.	Jesper Svenbro	1944	2006
9.	Torgny Lindgren	1938	1991
10.	Peter Englund	1957	2002
11.	Ulf Linde	1929	1977
12.	Per Wästberg	1933	1997
13.	Gunnel Vallquist	1918	1982
14.	Kristina Lugn	1948	2006
15.	Kerstin Ekman	1933	1978	Inactive
16.	Kjell Espmark	1930	1981
17.	Horace Engdahl	1948	1997	Permanent secretary 1999-
18.	Katarina Frostenson	1953	1992

See also: List of all members, past and present, of the Swedish Academy

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