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Benjamin Hoffmann

Portrait Hoffmann

Benjamin Hoffmann

College of Arts & Sciences Designated Professor of French & Director of the Center of Excellence

hoffmann.312@osu.edu

221 Hagerty Hall
1775 College Rd
Columbus, OH 43210

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Areas of Expertise

  • 18th-century French Literature and Philosophy
  • Creative Writing
  • Contemporary French Literature
  • Casanova & Chateaubriand
  • Transatlantic Studies

Education

  • PhD, Yale University
  • MA and MPhil, Yale University
  • Diplôme de l’École Normale Supérieure (Literature and Philosophy)
  • Master 2 de Littérature française, Paris IV-Sorbonne (Summa cum laude)
  • Licence de Philosophie, Bordeaux III
  • Licence de Lettres Modernes, Bordeaux III

Profile

I am a creative writer and the College of Arts & Sciences Designated Professor of French & Francophone Literature. A native of France, I received a licence de philosophie and a licence de lettres modernes from the Université Bordeaux III, as well as a master’s degree in French Literature from the Sorbonne. I am also a graduate in literature and philosophy of the École Normale Supérieure (Ulm). Following the completion of my Ph.D. at Yale University, I joined the faculty of The Ohio State University in 2015. I am the recipient of several fellowships and awards, including the Whiting Fellowship in the Humanities, the Marguerite A. Peyre Prize for outstanding dissertation, and a creative writing fellowship from the National Book Center (France). I was made a Knight in the Order of the Academic Palms (France) in 2024 and elected to the Royal Historical Society the following year. I am the founding director of the Center of Excellence at Ohio State, which promotes Franco-American relations and the dissemination of French and Francophone culture in the US. Within the Center of Excellence, I lead the Jules Verne Writing Residency, a creative writing residency that welcomes French-speaking novelists to Columbus. Via French Press, its YouTube literary channel, the Center of Excellence conducts regular interviews with novelists and thinkers who make the headlines in France. More information on our website: 

https://frenchcoe.osu.edu

Research Interests

My research focuses on eighteenth-century French literature and philosophy, with a particular interest in how "new worlds" were introduced into French and European culture from the beginning of the Age of Discovery through the Enlightenment. I have published a monograph on representations of America in eighteenth-century French literature, a critical edition of Lezay-Marnésia’s Letters Written from the Banks of the Ohio, an edition of Montesquieu's Spirit of Laws, a collective volume on Diderot and Posterity, and a second monograph on the concept of posterity.

I am also the author of essays on writers and topics such as Vivant-Denon, Diderot, Voltaire, Crèvecœur, Casanova, Montesquieu, Rousseau, the Counter-Enlightenment, the literature of Francophone Louisiana, and Digital Humanities. My articles were published by such journals as French Studies, French Forum, Orages, Eighteenth-Century Fiction, Dix-Huitième siècle, Recherches sur Diderot et sur l’Encyclopédie, Études françaises and Eighteenth-Century Studies. My op-eds and book reviews have appeared in La NRF, Le Monde, Regards protestants, La Règle du Jeu, H-France, Diacritik, Fabula, and Contreligne.  

My creative work intersects in many ways with my academic interests. I am the author of eight novels exploring themes and issues such as exile and the representation of otherness; nostalgia and the experience of bereavement; disinformation and the social impact of new technologies; the legacies of the Enlightenment and the Age of Discovery; and America’s history–real and reinvented–as well as its troubled present. My essays and short stories have appeared in Ploughshares, Analyse Opinion Critique, Les Écrits, L'Atelier du roman, Europe, Bastille Magazine, and various edited volumes, including Bella Italia and Écrivains d'Italie (Éditions de Grenelle, 2021 & 2023). 

Current Projects

I am currently supervising the completion of two different projects:

  • A new novel dedicated to 19th-century American history and the birth of paleontology, forthcoming in January 2026 with Éditions Denoël.  
  • A book about Francis Xavier and his Japanese translator, Anjirō.  

Awards & Fellowships (selection)

Recent Courses

  • French 2101: Introduction to French Studies
  • French 4401: Creative Writing in French
  • French 4401: The Interactive Enlightenment
  • French 4401: America in French Eyes – 18th-21st century
  • French 5202: French Literature in the Age of Discovery
  • French 5401: From the Sun King to World War I
  • French 5601: Center of Excellence Colloquium
  • French 8802: Eighteenth-Century Literary Experiments (Graduate seminar)
  • French 8802: Enlightenment and Desire (Graduate seminar)
  • French 1803.01: Virtual Paris (online seminar)
  • French 1803: Global May Paris (Study abroad program)

Publications

Monographs

Creative Writing

Critical Editions

Edited Volumes  

Books in Translation

 

People Filters:

French & Francophone Writing Now
French in the Americas
Migration Studies - Historic & Current
Popular & Material Cultures Across Times & Spaces