Performance Poet and Author of Dr. Mütter's Marvels

Cristin O’Keefe Aptowicz is a New York Times bestselling author and poet. She is the author of six books of poetry (including Dear Future Boyfriend, Hot Teen Slut, Working Class Represent, Oh, Terrible Youth and Everything is Everything) as well as the nonfiction book, Words In Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam, which Billy Collins wrote “leaves no doubt that the slam poetry scene has achieved legitimacy and taken its rightful place on the map of contemporary literature.” On the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) podcast Art Works, host Josephine Reed introduced Cristin as being “something of a legend in NYC’s slam poetry scene. She is lively, thoughtful, and approachable looking to engage the audience with her work and deeply committed to the community that art (in general) and slam poetry (in particular) can create.”

Cristin received "Best Books of 2014" honors from seven different publications for her biography Dr Mütter’s Marvels, a comprehensive and engaging biography of 19th-century surgeon, teacher and author Dr. Thomas Dent Mütter. Best known these days as the founding force behind the Mütter Museum of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, Mütter was a pioneer in establishing ethical norms for medical practice.