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To be honest, I suspect that someone reading Pride and Prejudice _after_ reading a bunch of ao3 stuff is going to suffer from https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SeinfeldIsUnfunn... to an extent; part of why was significant was just in establishing a bunch of tropes which have now been absolutely _done to death_.

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I've made sure to reference "historical significance" when referencing P&P and the Cabinet for this exact reason. I think every classic undergoes some amount of 'rot', but I've also found a lot of classic to be perfectly enjoyable if you allow them some slack.

And, not to insult fanfiction writers (I've been known to partake), but I would guess Jane Austen still writes a better broody man than most of them... although probably not all of them. That's a secondary consequence of simply having more people partaking in art to begin with: the more millions of artists you have, that many more one-in-a-million geniuses you're bound to find.

> but I would guess Jane Austen still writes a better broody man than most of them...

Whatever about that, she remains absolutely unbeaten in writing awful vicars.

(I assume this wasn't her intention, but the vicar is by far the most memorable character, for me.)

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