Nobel Academy left ‘in ruins’ over sexual abuse claims

Nobel Academy rocked by claims a member’s husband sexually assaulted 18 women and leaked winners’ names.

Katarina Frostenson with her husband Jean-Claude Arnault.

The body that awards the Nobel prize for literature has been rocked by three resignations over a sex scandal that widened yesterday with claims that winners’ names were regularly leaked.

Jean-Claude Arnault, the husband of Katarina Frostenson, a celebrated Swedish poet and a member of the Swedish Academy, has been accused of sexually assaulting 18 women, including other academy members, their wives and daughters. Mr Arnault has denied the charges.

Anders Olsson, a literary historian who has been one of the 18 members since 2008, said: “I want to believe that the academy can survive this crisis. I never thought that we were actually in such a severe crisis but I have come to realise it is worse than one can imagine.”

King Carl XVI Gustav, the academy’s patron, expressed his sadness as the dispute boiled over into the worst crisis in its 232-year history. He said the resignations were “a sad development that I hope will be solved”.

The academy was founded in 1786 by King Gustaf III to advance Swedish language and literature. It began the literature prize in 1901 after being named in the will of Alfred Nobel and given the annual task of identifying “the person who shall have produced in the field of literature the most outstanding work in an ideal direction”. It was one of the five Nobel prizes he created.

Frostenson, 65, one of the country’s foremost poets, was elected to membership of the academy in 1992. Her husband was accused last November of using his position as head of an influential arts venue, the Forum in Stockholm, to abuse numerous women. As a result the academy cut its annual funding to the Forum, which is co-owned by Mr Arnault and Frostenson.

The academy’s members, drawn from Sweden’s literary elite and appointed for life, then held an unprecedented secret ballot on a motion to remove Frostenson. The vote went her way, leading three of the members to announce their resignations on Friday. Technically they cannot leave, and those who have resigned in the past have been replaced only when they died.

Mr Arnault, 71, denies all the allegations against him and most are not being investigated by police because they took place beyond the statute of limitations for prosecution.

The academy now finds itself caught up in further controversy after the Dagens Nyheter newspaper, which first published the allegations against Mr Arnault but without identifying him, published claims yesterday that he had leaked the names of the literature prize winners seven times, including that of the 2016 laureate Bob Dylan. This has increased the pressure on the academy, which has long prided itself on its top-secret selection process.

Bjorn Wiman, the culture editor of Dagens Nyheter, said: “It is difficult to see how the Academy will be able to move on after this. The institution is in ruins.”

Peter Englund, one of the three members who resigned, said that he had done so because too many members “have given too great consideration to the individual and too little consideration to the by-laws and the core ideals of the association.”

The academy’s rules stipulate that a quorum of at least 12 members is necessary to make significant decisions such as electing a new member, although a simple majority is all that is needed to choose the prize winner.

Another member, Sara Stridsberg, is also said to be considering resigning and, with two others already on long-term leave for reasons not connected with the latest scandal, the academy is on the verge of institutional paralysis.

The Times