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Michel Zink, born in 1945, after studying classics at the École normale supérieure (Ulm) and the Sorbonne, specialized in French and Occitan language and literature of the Middle Ages. He was an assistant professor at the Sorbonne and the University of Tunis (1968-1976), a full professor at the University of Toulouse (1976-1987), and then at the University of Paris-Sorbonne (1987-1994). In 1994, the Collège de France created a chair of Medieval France Literatures for him, which he held until his retirement in 2016. He was Vice-President of the Collège de France from 2000 to 2012. In 2000 he was elected to the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres, of which he was the permanent secretary from 2011 to 2022. In 2022, he was elected to the Académie française.

His research and publications focus on many aspects of medieval literature, with a particular focus on lyric poetry, religious literature, and the religious impregnation of literature. He is the author of some thirty books in these fields, as well as novels, tales and essays.

He has been a visiting professor at a large number of European, American and Asian universities. He is a foreign member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Royal Swedish Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, the Academy of Lincei and the Academy of Japan, and a foreign correspondent of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, the Lisbon Academy of Sciences, the Medieval Academy of America, the Crusca Academy. He is also an honorary member of the Academies of Alsace, Lyon and Versailles.

He holds Honorary Doctorates from the Universities of Sheffield, Bucharest, Beijing (University of Normale Supérieure), Neuchâtel and Sofia.

He is Grand Officer of the Legion of Honor, Commander in the Order of Academic Palms, Commander in the Order of Arts and Letters, Commander in the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, Gold and Silver Star of the Order of the Rising Sun (Japan).