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Cate Marvin

Cate Marvin Books

Poet

Cate Marvin, born in 1969, is a talented poet whose works are known for their profound emotions and unique style. She has won numerous awards and has been widely praised by literary critics.

Fragment of the Head of a Queen: Poems

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“My day does not truly begin until I've acquired and consumed a 32-ounce Big Gulp of diet coke from 7-Eleven. It's the Big Gulp that's important, not 7-Eleven, where I find the employees rather disagreeable.”

Doe Important Bigs Diets Employee Consumed Eleven Coke Disagreeable Diet Coke

Author:Cate Marvin

“Because I wake up late, my day is often short. I'm much more active in the evenings, during which I alternately read, write, needle-point, smoke, email, and despair over my decision last June to put my television and DVD player out on the street because I wasn't getting enough work done.”

Writing Done Enough Lasts Decision Player Streets Television Despair Late Wake Up Active Evening Smoke Email June Needles Dvds Work Done

Author:Cate Marvin

“I've just always loved animals. So I've often thought that if I weren't a writer I'd work for some nonprofit organization that does something positive for animals.”

Ifs Doe Animal Organization Nonprofits

Author:Cate Marvin

“When asked what I'd be if I weren't a writer, I'm tempted to respond with one of father's favorite phrases, one I despised while growing up: "I hate 'what-ifs.'"”

Ifs Hate Father Growing Up Growing I Hate Phrases Tempted Despised

Author:Cate Marvin

“New York is one of those places people tend to derive a sense of identity from - as if, were to you to remove them from the City, they'd turn limp and colorless.”

People Ifs Turns Cities New York Identity Remove Colorless

Author:Cate Marvin

“I find the elitism and blatant provincialism of many (Manhattan-based) New Yorkers unattractive. Just as place can be an identity crutch that helps a person feel individual, place can be a crutch in poetry.”

Feels Persons Helping Individual Identity Manhattan New Yorkers Unattractive Crutches Elitism Provincialism

Author:Cate Marvin

“I admire the poetic relationship to place as enacted in Wallace Stevens' poems; his poetics strikes me as an argument against the restraints of realism.”

Argument Strikes Admire Poetic Realism Restraint

Author:Cate Marvin

“I prefer poems that occupy an imaginative sphere. When I lived in Cincinnati, I was occasionally referred to as an "Ohio Poet;" this made me uneasy, not only because I think of myself as a generally American poet but also because I like to think I write out of the country of my own mind.”

Thinking Writing Mind Made Country My Own Poet Spheres Imaginative Ohio Uneasy

Author:Cate Marvin

“Place is extremely important to my work because I am always pulling landscape imagery into my poems.”

Important Landscape Pulling Imagery

Author:Cate Marvin

“When fiction writers like my poems I feel like I've hit the jackpot.”

Feels Fiction Fiction Writers Jackpot

Author:Cate Marvin

“It takes a certain kind of mind to narrate, to work through character motivation, to be unforgiving to one's writer-self when it comes down to creating the minutiae of detail. Writing fiction requires stamina, a sense of how people's lives work, how people work toward and against one another and, above all, precision.”

People Writing Mind Kind Self Character Motivation Certain Fiction Creating Details Precision Stamina Writing Fiction Unforgiving Minutiae

Author:Cate Marvin

“The fiction writer has a lot of balls to juggle. Setting, pacing, dialogue, and so on. And let's not forget: plot. That was always a hard one for me. And I always had this spastic tendency to wrap up a story before I'd seen it the whole way through, a sort of writer's pre-ejaculatory tendency: "The End!"”

Way Ends Hard Whole Stories Forget Fiction Balls Setting Dialogue Tendencies Settings Plot Wraps Fiction Writers Pacing One For Me

Author:Cate Marvin

“I consider poetry my vocation, not my "career." My career is as a university professor; that's what pays the bills.”

Pay Careers Bills University Professors Vocation University Professors

Author:Cate Marvin

“To think of writing poetry as a "career" is not only ridiculous, it's dangerous. To the imagination. To the way one thinks of art. The reason poetry as a genre is so special is because it cannot be made a commodity.”

Thinking Way Writing Art Made Reason Imagination Careers Special Dangerous Ridiculous Genre Commodity Writing Poetry Genre Is

Author:Cate Marvin

“I do believe that one's writing life needs to be kept separate from Po-Biz. Personally, I deal with this by not attending too many poetry readings, primarily reading dead poets or poems in translation, reading Poets & Writers only once for grant/contest information before I quickly dispose of it, and not reading Poetry Daily. Ever.”

Needs Writing Believe Reading Deals Information Poet Grants Contests Writing Life Translations Attending Reading Poetry Dead Poets Poetry Reading

Author:Cate Marvin

“One cannot have "success" in poetry. If I wanted to be successful, I'd have become a lawyer.”

Ifs Wanted Successful Lawyer Being Successful

Author:Cate Marvin

“There IS a difference between poetry and prose! Poems should be sonically charged and new to the ear.”

Should Differences Ears Prose

Author:Cate Marvin

“Some poems take two to three years to finish. Rarely, a poem will arrive whole. It's nice when that happens. However, process has become so grueling for me over the past few years that when one of my students uses the word "inspiration" I practically shriek with laughter.”

Years Two Whole Use Inspiration Happens Past Three Process Nice Students Laughter Three Years Over The Past

Author:Cate Marvin

“I have no precise idea of who makes up my readership. I'm surprised when I discover people have read my poems at all.”

People Ideas Precise Readership

Author:Cate Marvin

“The cool thing about having a book is that it takes on its own life. Once it's in the world, you can't follow it. You'd have to have a pretty fantastic surveillance system to track its migration.”

World Book Track Fantastic Surveillance Migration Cool Things

Author:Cate Marvin

“Confessional poetry is, to my mind, more slippery than poems that are sloppily autobiographical; I find the confessional mode much more akin to dramatic monologue.”

Mind Dramatic Poetry Is Slippery Monologues

Author:Cate Marvin

“I like it when poems are challenging, when they concern matters important and personal to the author.”

Important Matter Challenges Concern

Author:Cate Marvin

“One of the reasons poetry is such an amazing genre to work with is because it constantly reinvents itself and re-negotiates its terms with the reader.”

Reason Term Reader Genre Poetry Is

Author:Cate Marvin

“I love teaching poetry writing. Students come into the class thinking poetry has to be one way, then leave having created pieces that are wholly original, that have - quite literally - never been made before.”

Thinking Way Writing Made Class Pieces Teaching Students Originals One Way Love Teaching

Author:Cate Marvin

“I encourage my students to be honest in their assessment of both the published work we read and the work of their classmates. I think there's always the occasion for discussing elements of craft, whether the student's poem is terrible or quite wonderful.”

Thinking Wonderful Honest Students Terrible Elements Crafts Occasions Being Honest Discussing Assessment Classmates

Author:Cate Marvin

“I place a lot of emphasis on process and revision because I believe that all of my students can become better writers through hard work.”

Believe Hard I Believe Process Students Hard Work Emphasis Revision

Author:Cate Marvin

“Different drinks have different metaphorical weight. Wine's heady, gin is poisonous, vodka's cold, and beer is plain boring. In real life, I'm a big fan of boxed white wine, much to the dismay of my more refined friends.”

Different Real Bigs White Fans Cold Drink Weight Wine Boring Real Life Beer Refined Poisonous Gin Vodka Metaphorical Dismay White Wine

Author:Cate Marvin

“I am like a table that eats its own legs off because it’s fallen in love with the floor.”

Tables Legs Fallen

Book:Fragment of the Head of a Queen: Poems

Source: Fragment of the Head of a Queen: Poems

About the Author

Born: 1969
Known for: Poet
Quotes: 28

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Writing Ifs Students Thinking Fiction Important Made Mind People Way

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People Ifs Thinking Knows Men World Way Want Love Life Inspirational Needs Giving Feels Should Writing Trying Years Mind Firsts

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