Should I be a good writer, or a successfull writer?

When I look at those writers who have made a lot of money from their writing, I do tend to despair. The likes of Dan Brown are not good writers, but they write popularist books, they get some clever publicity, and they sell bucket-loads. The same applies to E L James, author of the Fifty Shades series. I will admit that I haven't read them, nor do I wish to, but I have it on good authority that they are not carefully crafted pieces of work.

This is just a rant about books I don't like. The Harry Potter books by J K Rowling I enjoyed immensely, but they were not all great writing. There are some very clever ideas in them, but there is also some less well crafted parts. But it doesn't really matter, because people bought them anyway.

I was reminded recently of Erich von Daniken, another author from many years ago, who made a lot of money with claims of proof that we had been visited by extra terrestrials, and that this explained a range of mysteries across the world. The fact that his ideas have all been shown to be false and misguided, not to mention that they don't prove what he claims anyway, has not stopped him from making a whole lot of money.

And then there are people like myself, working hard to craft my books and stories, struggling to produce well written, well thought out writing, and I can't get an agent. Of course, it is not just me who can't get an agent - it is the fact that good, high-quality writing seems not to be as appreciated as we would like to think it should be. It makes me wonder why I should try to write something good and high quality, when the stuff that sells is the opposite.

I am not an elitist who thinks that everyone should read quality literature, not just popularist stuff. I understand why people like to read the popular works (and I have also read some of them), but I do think there should be more opportunities for more serious writers. I struggle that I should have to choose between these - that writers cannot, as a whole, make a living by writing high-quality fiction.

So I have to ask myself the question, again and again, whether I should seek to write high quality, in depth, complex works, which explore the important existential questions, but will not get me published, or just write something shocking, cheap or easy to sell, with no meaning, depth or real challenge. But my real call is to people who read material, not to give up just because it is not an easy, quick read. Make the effort to read deeper works, more complicated material. Not because that will make me money, but because that will challenge you, make you think. Because, in the end, if people only read sensationalist writing, that is all that will be available, and we will be diminished as a species.