Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt is one of the most renowned French writers in the world. His books have been translated into 48 languages, and his plays staged in more than 50 countries. He was born in Lyon in 1960. He studied philosophy and earned his PhD with a thesis on Diderot. He has worked as a script writer and director, translated opera librettos into French, worked as a comic writer and at times performed his own texts or accompanied pianists or sopranos on stage. His first theatre play, Don Juan On Trial, was published in 1991 and became hugely successful. The same happened with his next plays, which were performed by famous actors, such as Jean-Paul Belmondo, Alain Delon, Francis Huster, Jacques Weber, and Charlotte Rampling. In 2001, he was awarded the French Academy’s Grand Prix du Théâtre.
In 2012, he became a member of the Royal Academy of French Language and Literature of Belgium, and in 2016 his colleagues unanimously elected him a member of the Goncourt Jury.
