Some of the most vital writers of that time, among them Angela Carter and Kathy Acker, developed their own reckless, headlong takes on the high rhetorical style the genre requires.
Mentoring was also vital: "The writer Kerry Hudson set up WoMentoring: it's so important for people who don't have the opportunities, to enable people who have got talent to have a chance to use it".
And the fact that he can do all that and still make us laugh with low-brow pot and boner jokes and goofy song lyrics just proves how vital a writer he is.
This is particularly vital when the writer's editor "ankles," as they say in Hollywood, to another publisher, leaving the author without a cheerleader.
This is vital for a writer whose work deals so intimately with the physical and mental fabric of grief: the natural world may offer some consolation to those who, for whatever reason, suddenly confront the existential nature of their pain, but it would be absurd to suggest, as a single superfluous stroke of colour or light might do, that anything in the garden is, or could be, no more than lovely.
As for most writers, language is vital for me: a writer's ability to render a fictional world — characters, landscape, emotions — into something original that alters or deepens my understanding of both literature and life.
But the buzz in the air put me in mind of something the novelist Walter Kirn said not long ago, about why big cities are still vital for young writers.
Early success, either by wildfire word-of-mouth recommendation or a major prize – preferably both – is seen as vital; even then, writers can slip from "established" to "neglected" within the space of a couple of financially underperforming books.
Carey is probably too vital, too churning a writer to win with the present prize committee.
For Howey, self-publishing plays a vital role by allowing writers to "hone" their skills.
