When the World Spoke French

Marc Fumaroli is a scholar of French classical rhetoric and art. He is a member of the British Academy, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Société d’histoire littéraire de la France, and the Académie française. Fumaroli received from the Académie française, before being elected a member, the Monseigneur Marcel Prize in 1982 and the Critique Prize in 1992, and he is president of the Société des Amis du Louvre. He won the Balzan Prize for Literary History and Criticism in 2001, and is the author of numerous books including L'Âge de l'éloquence, Héros et orateurs, L'École du silence, and Trois institutions littéraires. Richard Howard received a National Book Award for his translation of Les Fleurs du mal and a Pulitzer Prize for Untitled Subjects, his third volume of poems. He is the translator of the NYRB Classics Alien Hearts and The Unknown Masterpiece.