Swedish Academy

The Swedish Academy or Svenska Akademien, founded in 1786 by King Gustav III, is one of the Royal Academies in Sweden. It was modeled after the French Academy and has 18 members. The motto of the academy is "Talent and Taste", or "Snille och Smak" in Swedish. The primary purpose of the academy is to further the "purity, vigour and majesty" of the Swedish language. To that end the academy publishes dictionaries.

The academy publishes a one-volume dictionary called Svenska Akademiens Ordlista (SAOL) and a multi-volume dictionary (similar to the Oxford English Dictionary) called Svenska Akademiens Ordbok (SAOB). The SAOL has reached its 12th edition while the first volume of the SAOB was published in 1898 and today (2003) work has progressed to words beginning with the letter "T".

Its current permanent secretary of the academy is Horace Engdahl, who was preceded by Sture Allén. Since 1901 the academy has annually decided who will be the laureate for the Nobel Prize in Literature, given in memory of the great donor Alfred Nobel.

See also: Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities