This year, the MacArthur Foundation selected twenty-one recipients for its “genius grants,” a list that contains four writers and poets, including Alison Bechdel, cartoonist and graphic memoirist; Samuel D. Hunter, playwright; Khaled Mattawa, translator and poet; and Terrance Hayes, poet. The fellowship, awarded to individuals of various disciplines, comes with a $625,000 prize, and involves an anonymous selection process (no one can apply and no one knows if they are under consideration).

As a Washington Post article explains, you don’t have to be a “genius” to become a MacArthur Fellow. Rather, any individual engaged in significant, original, and inventive work with the potential to steer his or her field into new terrains is a candidate.

Indeed, the writer-fellows have already made significant advances within their fields. Bechdel, 54 and living in Bolton, Vermont, has expanded the graphic form to encompass memoir and, in the process, has engaged in groundbreaking, “graphic” examinations of the lives of women in the lesbian community. Mattawa, 50, of Michigan, who translates the work of poets highly respected in the Arab community, such as Amjab Nasser of Jordan and Fadhill Al-Azzawi of Iraq, has been mediating the divide between Arab and American cultures with his work. And the experimentation of Hayes, 42, of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, has also taken the poetry community into new directions, as his work references historical personages and forms, while further exploring his own personal relationships, “pushing the art of poetry toward places altogether new.”

Of winning the award, Hunter, 33, said to The Washington Post that he found it “mythic.” “Somebody calls you out of the blue, and they tell you this thing. It’s like winning the lottery.”

In its explanation of its awards strategy, the MacArthur Foundation said that the fellowship may help fellows “advance their expertise, engage in bold new work, or, if they wish, to change fields or alter the direction of their careers.” Learn more about the 2014 MacArthur Fellows.