Born in Poitiers, Vienne, his early education was in Marseilles with secondary studies at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris.

The political satirist Jean Galtier-Boissière gave him the nickname "la Gestapette",[1] a portmanteau of Gestapo and tapette, the latter French slang for a homosexual.

[2] He was a member of the committee of the Groupe Collaboration, an organisation that aimed to encourage closer cultural ties between France and Germany.

[3] Bonnard was one of four members expelled from the Académie française after World War II for collaboration with Germany.

Bonnard received a symbolic sentence of 10 years banishment to be counted from 1945, but dissatisfied with the verdict, he chose to return to Spain where he lived out the remainder of his life.