Is there a common method to adscribe a writer/painter/person as belonging to a certain century?

As in "Herman Melville was a 19th century writer who...". Is it only used in such clear cases as someone born and dead inside the same century? Is it a matter of active years?

Doris Lessing (1919 - 2013) only wrote 3 or 4 books in the 21st century and lived most of her life in the 20th century. Margaret Atwood, born in 1939 has written more than a dozen books in the 21st century, J.K. Rowling lived for 35 years in the 20th century yet the majority of her work has been, and will be, created in the 21st. Cervantes wrote Quijote I in 1605 and II in 1615, his first novel dates back to 1585, and he only lived 16 years in the 17th century.

I understand that there are also chronological periods/eras to focus on (Shakespeare belonged to Elizabethan and Jacobean eras) and also artistic ones, but my question regards only centuries. I understand that the case may be that it is not advisable to refer by centuries to writers whose life/career spans 2 centuries.