Nobel figure quits after Swedish body's #MeToo scandal

STOCKHOLM,

Sara Danius resigned Tuesday from the Swedish Academy that selects the Nobel Prize in Literature, almost a year after she was forced out as permanent secretary by a #MeToo scandal.

The Swedish academic's resignation is the latest development in a scandal that emerged from the #MeToo movement to halt sexual abuse, and forced the Academy to postpone awarding the literature prize in 2018.

"I have decided to give up my seat... once occupied by the first woman elected to the Academy, Selma Lagerloef," Ms Danius, 56, said in a statement.

"It has been an honour," she added, without giving a reason for her decision.

ARNAULT CONVICTION

In April 2018, Ms Danius was forced to step down as the Academy's permanent secretary, the first woman to hold that position, amid a scandal sparked by Jean-Claude Arnault, an influential figure on Stockholm's cultural scene.

He was convicted of raping a young woman in October and December 2011 and the academy was caught up in the scandal because Mr Arnault was married to one of its members, Katarina Frostenson.

Mr Arnault, who is French, was accused by 18 women in all, and has appealed his conviction to Sweden's supreme court.

The Swedish Academy had also funded Mr Arnault's Forum club, which was popular among aspiring young authors hoping to make contact with publishers and writers.

Ms Danius, a literary scholar, joined the Academy in 2013 and became its permanent secretary two years later.

As such she was the voice and face of the body that awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature to Belarussian journalist Svetlana Alexievitch, US songwriter Bob Dylan and British novelist Kazuo Ishiguro.