Commercial versus literary fiction

A writer friend picked me up sharply recently for saying of a recent bestseller, 'Oh, it's only commercial fiction...' The division between commercial fiction and literary fiction is an artificial one, she argued, a marketing ploy for publishers, rather than a distinction recognised by authors. My friend, who has written both types, maintained they required the same skills and gifts and are equally difficult to write. She objected to the inference that commercial fiction is somehow inferior to its esoteric cousin.

Whether a writer has found it hard to write a book is beside the point for the consumer. We'd rather listen to Mozart than Salieri, and we don't expect the primo ballerino to hobble off stage going 'ooh, me back...' But that aside, just what is the difference? I thought I knew what I meant, but the distinction is hard to pin down.

I was once snarkily asked by a radio presenter: 'Why hasn't Catherine Cookson ever won the Booker prize?' When you're in the mood for a Mars bar, I said, you want it to be exactly like every other Mars bar you've ever had. Literary fiction is more like a gourmet dinner: a search for new flavours and techniques. (OK, I was being pretentious.) Commercial fiction has a pre-masticated quality, literary fiction is... snail porridge.

All professionally published works have to be commercial in some sense, and the aim to reach as many readers as possible is not an ignoble one. The wonderful Iris Murdoch (who did of course win the Booker prize) was capable of sloppy writing and saminess. Her books are wildly enjoyable (just in case anyone thought literary fiction has to be tough going). From what I remember she sold pretty well too. Ian McEwan is an easy read (getting easier) and a bestseller. The Brontes wrote genre fiction and Jane Austen was commercial. Du Maurier's 'Rebecca' is commercial fiction but as near to great literature as makes no difference, and 'Frankenstein', creaky, dated and clumsily written, is resonant as only works of genius can be. 'Commercial fiction' as a definition seems to dissolve the more you think about it, like all those Socratic dialogues about beauty and virtue.

'Well, maybe I mean it just isn't very good,' I eventually said to my friend.