Biography
Engdahl was born in Karlskrona, Blekinge, Sweden. He earned his B.A. in 1970 at Stockholm University; he earned his doctoral degree (fil. dr.) in 1987, with a study on Swedish romanticism, but had meanwhile been active as a literary critic, translator and journal editor, and was one of the introducers of the continental tradition of literary scholarship in Sweden. He is adjunct professor of Scandinavian literature at the University of Aarhus in Denmark. He speaks Swedish, English, German, French and Russian fluently.
On October 16, 1997, Engdahl became a member of the Swedish Academy, elected to seat number 17 vacated by the death of Johannes Edfelt; on June 1, 1999, he succeeded Sture Allén as the Academy's permanent secretary, i.e. its executive member and spokesperson. As such, he had the annual task of announcing the recipient of the Nobel prize in literature to the public. On December 20, 2008 it was announced that after ten years Engdahl would step down as the Academy's permanent secretary on June 1, 2009.
He is married to Ebba Witt-Brattström, professor of literature at Södertörn University outside Stockholm. Together they have three sons.
Read more about this topic: Horace Engdahl
Famous quotes containing the word biography:
“In how few words, for instance, the Greeks would have told the story of Abelard and Heloise, making but a sentence of our classical dictionary.... We moderns, on the other hand, collect only the raw materials of biography and history, “memoirs to serve for a history,” which is but materials to serve for a mythology.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Just how difficult it is to write biography can be reckoned by anybody who sits down and considers just how many people know the real truth about his or her love affairs.”
—Rebecca West (1892–1983)
“There never was a good biography of a good novelist. There couldn’t be. He is too many people, if he’s any good.”
—F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896–1940)