A writer without an audience is an unhappy writer. But a writer who writes just for that audience will not always be any more satisfied. The great satirist Kingsley Amis (Lucky Jim) explained why to The Paris Review:

I read somewhere recently somebody saying, “When I want to read a book, I write one.” I think that’s very good. It puts its finger on it, because there are never enough books of the kind one likes: one adds to the stock for one’s own entertainment…