King Juan Carlos plans to attend, on February 9, in Paris, Mario Vargas Llosa's admission ceremony to the French Academy. The emeritus king has accepted the invitation made by the writer and Nobel Prize winner himself. The now emeritus king will go to the French capital accompanied by the Infanta Cristina, as confirmed this Wednesday to La Vanguardia by sources from the prestigious cultural institution
The presence of King Juan Carlos at the Parisian ceremony had been anticipated by Vargas Llosa himself in a statement to El País. The novelist specified that he had sent him the invitation because of the friendship that he has united them for years. Vargas Llosa insisted that the emeritus monarch had always been very affectionate with him. "It is a gesture of pure sympathy -said the Nobel Prize winner to El País- I have no relationship with him, nor do we see each other. Kings do not have friends, they have sudden ones". Vargas Llosa added a significant tagline to his comments: "And since he is in the doldrums, I remember him."
The Spanish-Peruvian writer obtained Spanish nationality in 1993. In 2011, the then King of Spain granted him the title of Marquis de Vargas Llosa, a recognition that was later and complementary to that of the Nobel Prize in Literature.
The presence of King Juan Carlos in Paris will be an event in itself, beyond the ceremony at the French Academy. Since he self-exiled to Abu Dhabi, in the summer of 2020, his only public appearances outside the emirates were his controversial private trip to Sanxenxo (Pontevedra), in May 2022, and trips to London, in September of last year, to the funeral of Elizabeth II, and the one held recently in Greece for the obsequies of Constantine of Greece, her brother-in-law.
Vargas Llosa will be the first author without an original work written in French to enter a legendary institution, guardian of the language of Molière, which was founded by Cardinal Richelieu in 1635. The novelist, who lived in Paris and was greatly influenced by the French culture and literature, has been in the news lately for reasons unrelated to his profession. The breakdown of his sentimental relationship with Isabel Preysler made rivers of ink flow.
Vargas Llosa's election in the select group of the so-called immortals occurred in November 2021 by 18 votes out of 22. There was some controversy over the fact that he was not a writer in French. His chair will be number 18, which was occupied by the philosopher Michel Serres until his death in June 2019. Currently the Academy is made up of 35 members. Seat 14 is occupied by the expert historian in Russia Helène Carrère d'Encausse, 93, who is also the "life secretary" of the institution. Carrère d'Encausse is a regular on television sets as an analyst of the current war in Ukraine.
