Dr Mary Dobson is an Affiliated Scholar and Member of St. John’s College, University of Cambridge. She is an historian of medicine with wide ranging interests. In particular, she has worked extensively on the history of malaria in England and sub-Saharan Africa. Born in 1954, she was educated in Kent and South London before studying Geography at Oxford University, where she was awarded a BA with first class honours in 1976 and a DPhil in 1982. She has held a number of Research Fellowships, including a Harkness Fellowship at Harvard University, and was formerly Director of the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, Oxford, and a Fellow of Green Templeton College. Mary is a Member of the Society of Authors and an Associate Member of the Royal Society of Medicine.
She is author of a variety of publications ranging from academic articles and monographs to popular science and history. These include CONTOURS OF DEATH AND DISEASE IN EARLY MODERN ENGLAND (Cambridge University Press, 1997); DISEASE: THE EXTRAORDINARY STORIES BEHIND HISTORY’S DEADLIEST KILLERS (Quercus, 2007; Metro Books, 2013; translated into German, Japanese, and Chinese); THE STORY OF MEDICINE: FROM BLOODLETTING TO BIOTECHNOLOGY (Quercus, 2013; translated into German and Chinese); and MURDEROUS CONTAGION: A HUMAN HISTORY OF DISEASE (Quercus, 2015). She has also written a series of ‘scratch ’n sniff’ SMELLY OLD HISTORY books for children, published by Oxford University Press in 1997-98 and translated into six languages.
In 2014, Dr Mary Dobson and her late husband, Professor Sir Christopher Dobson, jointly gave a lecture in the Darwin College Lecture Series on ‘Plagues' and likewise at the Hay Festival of that year. Together they also wrote a chapter entitled PLAGUES AND HISTORY: FROM THE BLACK DEATH TO ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE for Plagues, a book edited by Jonathan Heeney (Cambridge University Press, 2017). Their joint venture of piecing together the history of infectious diseases with the modern plagues is of great relevance with the current pandemic of COVID-19.
Dr Mary Dobson also features in a film on the Spanish flu that was produced by Cambridge University in November 2018. Here she discusses the history of the 1918 pandemic. With over 5 million views, it continues to be the most watched film on the university’s YouTube Channel.
Dr Dobson wrote the essay 'Plagues, Pandemics and Planetary Health' for Lucy Hawking's GEORGE AND THE SHIP OF TIME (Corgi Children's, 2018). Her next book ANATOMICA: A COMPENDIUM OF BLOOD, BONES AND BODIES will be published by Head of Zeus.
She is author of a variety of publications ranging from academic articles and monographs to popular science and history. These include CONTOURS OF DEATH AND DISEASE IN EARLY MODERN ENGLAND (Cambridge University Press, 1997); DISEASE: THE EXTRAORDINARY STORIES BEHIND HISTORY’S DEADLIEST KILLERS (Quercus, 2007; Metro Books, 2013; translated into German, Japanese, and Chinese); THE STORY OF MEDICINE: FROM BLOODLETTING TO BIOTECHNOLOGY (Quercus, 2013; translated into German and Chinese); and MURDEROUS CONTAGION: A HUMAN HISTORY OF DISEASE (Quercus, 2015). She has also written a series of ‘scratch ’n sniff’ SMELLY OLD HISTORY books for children, published by Oxford University Press in 1997-98 and translated into six languages.
In 2014, Dr Mary Dobson and her late husband, Professor Sir Christopher Dobson, jointly gave a lecture in the Darwin College Lecture Series on ‘Plagues' and likewise at the Hay Festival of that year. Together they also wrote a chapter entitled PLAGUES AND HISTORY: FROM THE BLACK DEATH TO ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE for Plagues, a book edited by Jonathan Heeney (Cambridge University Press, 2017). Their joint venture of piecing together the history of infectious diseases with the modern plagues is of great relevance with the current pandemic of COVID-19.
Dr Mary Dobson also features in a film on the Spanish flu that was produced by Cambridge University in November 2018. Here she discusses the history of the 1918 pandemic. With over 5 million views, it continues to be the most watched film on the university’s YouTube Channel.
Dr Dobson wrote the essay 'Plagues, Pandemics and Planetary Health' for Lucy Hawking's GEORGE AND THE SHIP OF TIME (Corgi Children's, 2018). Her next book ANATOMICA: A COMPENDIUM OF BLOOD, BONES AND BODIES will be published by Head of Zeus.
