Érik Orsenna is the pen-name of Érik Arnoult (born 22 March 1947 in Paris), a French politician and novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

ist. After studying philosophy and political science at the Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris

Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris

The Institut d'études politiques de Paris , simply referred to as Sciences Po , is a public research and higher education institution in Paris, France, specialised in the social sciences. It has the status of grand établissement, which allows its admissions process to be highly selective...

 ("Sciences Po"), Orsenna specialized in economics at the London School of Economics

London School of Economics

The London School of Economics and Political Science is a public research university specialised in the social sciences located in London, United Kingdom, and a constituent college of the federal University of London...

. He was a close collaborator of François Mitterrand

François Mitterrand

François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand was the 21st President of the French Republic and ex officio Co-Prince of Andorra, serving from 1981 until 1995. He is the longest-serving President of France and, as leader of the Socialist Party, the only figure from the left so far elected President...

 and held several government positions in the 1980s and 1990s. He is a member (currently on leave) of the Conseil d'État, having been appointed in 1985. He was elected to the Académie française

Académie française

L'Académie française , also called the French Academy, is the pre-eminent French learned body on matters pertaining to the French language. The Académie was officially established in 1635 by Cardinal Richelieu, the chief minister to King Louis XIII. Suppressed in 1793 during the French Revolution,...

 on 28 May 1998.
For Voyage au pays du coton he received the second prize of the Lettre Ulysses Award

Lettre Ulysses Award

The Lettre Ulysses Award for the Art of Reportage has been given annually since 2003 for the best texts in the genre of literary reportage, which must have been first published during the previous two years...

 in 2006.

External links

L'Académie française