Eileen Pollack

Eileen Pollack is a novelist, essayist, and short story writer known for her work at the intersection of science, gender equity, and literature. Pollack was one of the first two women to graduate from Yale with a Bachelor of Science in physics before earning an MFA from the University of Iowa, where she received a Teaching-Writing Fellowship. Her early experiences as a woman in the sciences, including challenges related to isolation and lack of encouragement, have informed much of her writing on women in STEM fields.

Pollack is the author of several novels, including "The Professor of Immortality," "The Bible of Dirty Jokes," "A Perfect Life," and "Breaking and Entering," which won the Grub Street National Book Prize and was named a New York Times Editor's Choice selection. She has published two collections of short fiction, "The Rabbi in the Attic" and "In the Mouth," the latter of which received the Edward Lewis Wallant Award. Her novella "The Bris" was selected for inclusion in Best American Short Stories, and her stories have been recognized with two Pushcart Prizes, the Cohen Award from Ploughshares, and honors from Literary Review and MQR. Pollack's essays have appeared in Best American Essays and Best American Travel Writing.

In nonfiction, Pollack is recognized for her investigative memoir, "The Only Woman in the Room: Why Science Is Still a Boys' Club," published by Beacon Press. The book, which examines cultural, social, psychological, and institutional barriers facing women in STEM, draws on years of interviews and research. Her article "Why Are There Still So Few Women in Science?" appeared in The New York Times Magazine and contributed to national conversations about gender bias in science and technology. Pollack's creative nonfiction "Woman Walking Ahead: In Search of Catherine Weldon and Sitting Bull" was adapted into a motion picture featuring Jessica Chastain, Sam Rockwell, and Michael Greyeyes.

A collection of her essays, "Maybe It's Me: On Being the Wrong Kind of Woman," was published by Delphinium Books and received positive reviews from Publisher's Weekly, Kirkus, and Forward. Pollack has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Michener Foundation, the Rona Jaffe Foundation, and the Massachusetts Arts Council. She has served as a faculty member and director of the Helen Zell MFA Program in Creative Writing at the University of Michigan. Pollack lives and writes in Boston, contributing to ongoing discussions about creativity, gender equity, and the relationship between science and the arts.