Raised in Washington, DC, Cate Marvin uses her work to explore what it means to be an “American poet,” and she often cites Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson as major influences. Marvin is interested in how American identity collides with the English language, focusing heavily on language play and on the intersection of identity, language, and the natural landscape. An accomplished poet and fiction writer as well as an academic, Marvin holds an MFA in poetry from the University of Houston, an MFA in fiction from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and a PhD in English and comparative literature from the University of Cincinnati.
 
Her poetry collections include World’s Tallest Disaster (2001), which won the Kathryn A. Morton Prize in Poetry, and Fragment of the Head of a Queen (2007). Marvin co-edited, with Michael Dumanis, the anthology Legitimate Dangers: American Poets of the New Century (2006). With poet Erin Belieu, she is the co-founder and co-director of VIDA: Women in the Literary Arts, an organization that seeks to “explore critical and cultural perceptions of writing by women” in contemporary culture.
 
Marvin’s many honors include the Kate Tufts Discovery Prize and a Whiting Award. Marvin has taught poetry at Lesley University’s Low-Residency MFA program and is associate professor of creative writing at the College of Staten Island of the City University of New York.