Quote:
Originally Posted by VydorScope
Yeah, I disagree with HarryT. I think his "4th" definition is really my 3rd one dressed up in fancier cloths. I have read Dickens, and others of the "classics" and I do not see how they are all that much better then the best authors we have today. BUT this is all subjective so there is really no right or wrong.
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No, they are really quite different. "It's stood the test of time." isn't remotely the same as "Some scholars and other erudites have labeled it good." A work that has stood the test of time is one that readers have continued to read over long periods of time. Scholars calling it good doesn't make people read it.
Shakespeare is still performed 400 years later. Part of that is because is can be performed for free, but that's not all of it, there are a vast number of playwrights whose work could be performed for free, but they are rarely performed. People adapt Shakespeare for movies, and people pay to watch. People know the basic plots of the stories, even if they haven't seen or read one of his plays (plays are really meant to be wached rather than read). People routinely quote Shakespeare, and the references are understood.
I'm not saying that people have to like Shakespeare, or Moby Dick or Dickens. There are classics that I don't like, but this doesn't make them bad books, or mean that I am wrong not to like it. Their enduring popularity isn't due to academic decree. Academics can make people study a fossil, but can't make it live.