ABOUT
Photo by Jasmin Valcarcel.
Edna Bonhomme is an American critic, journalist, and historian. She is the author of A History of the World in Six Plagues (Eingesperrt und ausgegrenzt), which was shortlisted for the 2025 Best Science Book Prize in Austria. Bonhomme is a 2026 Finalist for NBCC Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing. Her criticism, literary essays, book reviews, and opinion pieces on health, sexual politics, and culture have been published in Al Jazeera, The Atlantic, The Baffler, Esquire, Frieze, The Guardian, London Review of Books, The Nation, The New York Review of Books and more. Bonhomme is the recipient of awards and fellowships from the Max Planck Institute for History of Science, the Ludwig Maximilian Universität, the Camargo Foundation, Baldwin for the Arts, the Robert Silvers Foundation, and the Andy Warhol Foundation. She’s a Lecturer at the Universität der Künste in Berlin. Bonhomme is the co-editor of After Sex, a literary anthology about reproductive justice and the forthcoming book, Tending to Our Wounds, which will be published in July 2026.
A graduate of Princeton University’s Ph.D. program in History of Science, her research examines contagion, epidemics, and toxicity by asking: what makes people sick? As a culture writer, she is committed to profiles and reflections in literature and the arts. As a journalist, she investigates disorders, medical experiments, reproductive health, and toxicity. Edna’s writing about illness and health draws on her education, which includes a bachelor of arts in biology from Reed College, a master's in public health from Columbia University, and a doctorate of philosophy in the history of science from Princeton University.
In addition, Edna’s multimedia artwork has been exhibited internationally at the alpha nova galeria futura, ARIEL Feminisms, Austrian Association of Women Artists, Gwangju Biennale, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Savvy Contemporary Galerie, Kunstverein Hildesheim, Digital Prater Gallery, and other creative spaces. Edna co-hosts, As We See It, a radio show with Refuge Worldwide that explores the political and cultural scene in Berlin. In recent years, she has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in Germany (Bard College Berlin, Free University Berlin, Humboldt University, and Universität der Künste Berlin) and the United States on cinema, race, global medicine, and pandemics.
Collective power is vital to her; as such, she is a member of the National Book Critics Circle, the Author’s Guild, and the National Writer’s Union. If you want to read her reflections about history, science, and culture, consider signing up to Edna’s Substack newsletter, Mobile Fragments. For those who are dying to know, Edna was born and raised in Miami by a collective of cheeky working-class people. Like her parents, Edna is a mobile spore, and she is currently based in Berlin, Germany. She is represented by Ian Bonaparte at Janklow & Nesbit. For literary queries, please contact him directly.
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