Chloé Delaume Archive The Unbearable Rancidity of French Letters Author: A.K. Afferez | Dec192017 Categories: Critical Essays No comments The first woman to be admitted into the French Academy was Marguerite Yourcenar, in 1980. Nowadays, as we’re nearing the Academy’s 400th anniversary, the proportion of women remains dismally low, and the members are overwhelmingly white.