Classics like Dickens and Austen are still on school syllabi, but I wonder if their cultural weight now outweighs their relevance. My niece struggled through Great Expectations last semester and asked me why she couldn't just read a modern novel about similar themes—class, ambition, growth. We had a good talk, but I couldn't shake the feeling that she had a point, especially when so much contemporary fiction explores those ideas with language she actually connects to. Is there a genuine educational value in reading these older texts, or are we just preserving them out of habit and institutional inertia?