But then again, I don't really like most literature, as it's used in English classes (that's how I'll use it for the rest of this rant). It's okay, but it doesn't speak to me the way speculative fiction does. And, eventually, this got me thinking about what we use to define quality.
Most people who care about quality share some of the same criteria: good characterization; proper mechanics and spelling, or the creative misuse thereof... The other aspects are what changes from genre to genre, and it may explain why people in other genres, especially literature, may seem so myopic to others.
Some areas of literature and speculative fiction, for example, respect narrative which is not (at least on first glance) logical or coherent. Think anything stream-of-consciousness, for example. To somebody who prefers mysteries, it may seem nuts that this kind of thing is enjoyed by many people. Mystery readers, science fiction readers, and literature buffs mostly respect unstilted, realistic dialogue—but high fantasy readers may enjoy both realistic dialogue and more epic or heroic language which sounds odd to 21st-century ears.
I'm most familiar with the requirements of good spec fic, as that's mostly what I read. In general, we idolize good imagination. We ask for stories which are not so far removed from us that they have no bearing on our current situation, but stories which are not so close to us that they might conceivably happen in the next couple of years. Stories which are exemplary in terms of imagine might not mean as much to fans of literature, since even if the characters are much better than most literature characters, and even if the language is unimpeachable, that removal from a familiar setting takes away some of what literature people enjoy—maybe finding symbolism. It's not even necessarily that they mind the setting (though maybe they do); it's just that one of the ingredients is missing. It's like unsalted mashed potatoes, I guess. They may be the most mouth-watering, creamy, melty mashed potatoes you've ever had—but if you like salt, it's never going to be quite good enough. The mistake made by people in different genre camps, I think, is saying that a book isn't good, or as good, because it doesn't have a certain element; it's like saying those mashed potatoes are terrible just because somebody didn't make them the way you liked.
(This is a different matter, at least in my head, from genre conventions. It's more related to the things that make those conventions what they are—alien settings because we value imagination, cool science in sf because we're mostly shiny-new-thing nerds, etc.)
And all of this, of course, is separate from enjoyment. You can enjoy something without thinking it's good. To my mind, it's a lot harder to think something is good without enjoying it—as a friend once said to me about modernist art, "You're not supposed to enjoy it like 'ooh, that's pretty,' you're supposed to enjoy it like 'ooh, I never thought about it that way.'" The enjoyment may be different from normal, but there's still something fun and stimulating about it. But, again, if you're used to a certain kind of enjoyment, another kind may make you think the product has less quality. Lois McMaster Bujold's Miles books are really good science fiction (although her world-building leaves something to be desired), but sometimes you sort of forget that in the romp, if you know what I mean—you forget to be impressed.
And maybe that's another thing, in the genre quality debate. You're supposed to be impressed by good things, and you don't know all of what another genre's basic attempted aspects are, so you don't know how to be impressed—you think all of that genre does that. The opposite happens, I think, when you find a new genre you like—you're so amazed, maybe, that people can think up new scientific things, because you like that; it's only later you learn to discriminate, as you learn that new science things are a dime a dozen, but the shiny doesn't mean much unless it's well-supported by knowledge and skill.
