Dime novel quality works have been around since the end of the 19th century. These stories are the loose and fanciful creations from people who don't care what story they put together so long as it is entertaining and profitable. Today, dime novel quality stories permeate our libraries, movies, and television shows.
This is what wikipedia has to say about them.
"In the modern age, "dime novel" has become a term to describe any quickly written, lurid potboiler and as such is generally used as a pejorative to describe a sensationalized yet superficial piece of written work."
Those are fighting words. So why do we ingest such terrible literature?
It would be easier to start with what makes good literature. In my humble opinion, good literature is about potential. Good literature is literature that has a voice to reveal truth. It says something about the condition of humanity and/or its place in the universe. It gives way to deeper thinking and possibly real world application or change. Change isn't a required component, but there definitely has to be some inspired reflection on the truths as they are revealed.
That said, not everyone is going to have brilliant "ah ha's!" when they read something touted as good literature. Still, the potential for depth has to be there to be considered literature.
Compare that to the dime novel.
The dime novel is like my experience with Twilight; it's a short lived enjoyment that inspires no depth or internal awareness. You don't feel compelled to re-read these because you already got all you could get on the first go around. You're welcome to still re-read them, but the second experience could never be as good as the first. It's a book that says absolutely nothing, but gives you a thrill anyway.
Most genres strive to have a mixture of the two and many succeed. Shows like Avatar, the Last Airbender, Doctor Who, and Sherlock give people something to think about while at the same time being highly entertaining. They are often modernly called, "smart shows."
So why are there so many stories in the world, but only a fraction of them are worth the time?
Quantity and Demand
The people demand a thousand channels with a thousand stories to spend all their spare time on at any given moment of the day. The newer, the more exciting, the better. The people also demand new books to be released almost as fast as they can read them. This puts a lot of pressure on the companies that produce the entertainment to churn out products almost as fast as they can come up with them. There is no time for the depth of literature to sink into the creative process before the lights are out and the presses have stopped running. Shows like Sherlock can bypass this problem by taking three years to hammer out fine details, but most stories don't have that luxury.
Addiction to "New"
New stories are exciting. Repeating old experiences in a new format is both comforting and entertaining. When the subject is superficial though, we have no reason to stay and many reasons to feel bored. We ingest dime novel quality novels so often that we've fallen into the habit of excited anticipation, consumption, rejection, and impatience for the next big story. We've followed this pattern as a society so much that we hardly even notice that the "new story" of today is the same crap story of yesterday.
Personal Test: Do you have a new favorite book or story that you experienced last year? What was it? Have you revisited it since you first found it? How do you feel about it today. Now that you're aware of the cycle, would you go back and enjoy what you once had, or is it not worth the time to re-experience?
Anti-Reflection
Our society is currently molded on the belief that if you don't think about it, its not your problem and nothing is wrong. The antithesis is saying if you don't constantly think about something you don't actually care, but that's a different social problem.
Literature has the nasty habit of bringing deep thinking and reflection to the foreground; which provides an environment where you see things that you'd rather not see or deal with. One of the nastiest truths literature likes to bring up is the myth of the happy ending. There's this modern myth that life has to be good. There's a finish line that if you reach it, it will mark the beginning of eternal happiness and contentment. If life isn't good, then something is wrong, you're not on track to the golden finish line. Therefore, if something is wrong, then we have a responsibility to "fix it" or suffer forever. Literature often teaches that life isn't always good and that its normal to experience bad things. Literature also teaches that some things just can't be fixed, life isn't perfect, and that's totally normal. It's very different from the "disney-fied" messages of our youth and very uncomfortable to us because we're not used to acknowledging that side of life.
Kinda sad when you think about it. Life and adulthood does eventually happen. Wouldn't it be better to be prepared for it? I'm not saying, cast out all hope, but at least have more realistic expectations for what life is like. It is better to live with meaning, than to live for the happy ending.
If you've ever read Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, then you probably couldn't help but notice how many today are like the character of the wife. The fact that's she's introduced as a suicide risk is telling on how living without meaning takes a tole on the human spirit. She was willing to go into debt to increase her experience in fantasy and perceived happiness. She would rather continue living in her meaningless make believe world with her "family" of entertaining tv personalities than deal with the internal problems of emptiness she knows is there, but doesn't acknowledge. Whenever her husband tried to get her to engage in any kind of conversation that had depth, she avoided and rejected him.
Conclusion
Personally, as a writer, I've always wanted to be someone who said something. I grew up on dime novels and better. I enjoyed the stories about dragons and fairy queens, but the stories I enjoyed the most had dragons and inspired self-reflection. My goal is to be the kind of writer to who can trick dime novel addicts into a state of reflection and reveal truth among the spoils of entertainment. If my name is going to be on the cover, I want it to be a work I can be proud of. Something that will be loved and will last at least a few decades. That's why I refuse to publish until I am absolutely ready. My expectations are high, I'll probably still fail, but at least I tried.
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