Birgitta Trotzig

On 15 May 2011, Peter Englund published the news of Trotzig's death in the evening of 14 May after a long illness.

Birgitta Trotzig was the recipient of many literary prizes, amongst others the Övralid Prize in 1997. Birgitta Trotzig lived in Lund and remained active in public life and with the various projects of the Swedish Academy for much of her later life.

She was a writer, known for Kejsaren (1979), Kyrie (1965) and Målarens öga/Diktarens öga (1968).

Trotzig was born in Gothenburg, Sweden, as an only child. The family lived initially with her maternal grandparents in Gothenburg, later moving to the small southern city of Kristianstad, where her parents' parents worked as teachers. She graduated from grammar/high school in 1948. Trotzig returned to Gothenburg and studied literary history. She began writing for the national newspaper Aftonbladet and for the literary magazine Bonniers Litterära Magasin. She married artist and sculptor Ulf Trotzig and lived in Paris from 1955 to 1969 with her husband; during this period she converted to Roman Catholicism. Through her conversion, she gained access to various aspects of French culture and to Christian and Jewish mysticism; she became very interested in San Juan de la Cruz and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin.

Birgitta Trotzig was born on September 11, 1929 in Gothenburg, Västra Götalands län, Sweden.