STOCKHOLM — A Swedish prosecutor brought rape charges on Tuesday against Jean-Claude Arnault, the man at the center of a scandal that shook international cultural circles and led to the cancellation of this year’s Nobel Prize in Literature.

The charges are the first to emerge from a furor that has badly damaged the reputation of the Swedish Academy, the august, 232-year-old body that awards the literature prize, and has prompted power struggles, recriminations and resignations there.

Mr. Arnault, 71, has long been a cultural gatekeeper in Sweden and beyond — a French photographer who ran Forum, a prominent cultural center in Stockholm that received financial support from the Swedish Academy. He is married to one academy member, and is close to others.

A number of women have accused him of using his sway in the arts world, including his connections to the academy, to pressure young women in the arts into sex, and have said that some offenses took place at academy-owned apartments in Stockholm and Paris. Many of the accusations concerned episodes too long ago for prosecution under Swedish law.