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American Author Wins Top French Literary Prize

France?s top literary prize ? the Prix Goncourt ? has been won by a popular American author, Jonathan Littell. The book, ?The Kindly Ones? (?Les Bienveillantes?) is a novel narrated by an SS officer and the 900-page text was written in French. While Littell was born in the United States, he later moved to France and the book was written as a tribute to two important influential French authors ? Stendhal and Gustave Flaubert.

The modest Littell, son of the famous spy book author, Robert Littell (?The Legends?, ?An Agent in Place?) preferred to play down the importance of winning the Goncourt Prize, although he was reported to be honored by the award. Littell presently lives in Barcelona, Spain and was not present in Paris when the award was announced. The book has been top of the French best-seller list for several weeks now and has sold over 200,000 copies in a little under 3 months.

The 103 year-old Prix Goncourt is a particularly sought after honor among European literarians. Previous winners include top authors such as Simone de Beauvoir and Marcel Proust and their works are guaranteed top sales and wide acclaim in literary circles. The jurors who vote on the award, follow a tradition of meeting in a Parisian restaurant before announcing the winner. Littell was quoted to have been ?very happy? about the award.