Esmé Louise James

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Dr. Esmé Louise James completed her PhD in 2024 at the University of Melbourne, her thesis tracing an aesthetic of the erotic across eighteenth-century literature. With a combined following of over 3.5 million people across social platforms, Esmé is trailblazing a future of edu-tainment. She has received two nominations for Best Digital Creator at the AACTA Awards, and was awarded Media Weeks Best Digital Talent in 2024. She's a TEDx speaker (Writing kinky sex back into the history pages), appears in the Top 30 Emerging Writers list (SBS), is the winner of the Rising Star Alumni Award (University of Melbourne) and recipient of Screen Australia’s Every Voice initiative. Esmé's debut book, Kinky History: The Stories of Our Intimate Lives, Past and Present was published in Australia in 2023 by Pantera Press, and made available worldwide in 2024 by Tarcher Perigree. The first translated edition hit shelves in 2025.

Education

  • 2024 
    University of Melbourne, Doctor of Philosophy
  • 2018 
    University of Melbourne, Bachelor of Arts (Honours)
  • 2017 
    University of Melbourne, Bachelor of Arts

Publications

  • 2024
    Kinky History A Rollicking Journey through Our Sexual Past, Present, and Future, Penguin Random House
  • 2023
    Kinky History: The Stories of Our Intimate Lives, Past and Present, Pantera Press
  • 2021
    Roots: Home is Who We Are, Hardie Grant Press
  • 2020
    Celebrating Enigmas: Re-Examining Gertrude Stein's Relationship to the Literary Canon, Hecate Journal

Contact Esmé for

  • General
  • Media request
  • Speaking request
  • Consulting / Advising
  • Research collaboration
  • Research supervision