Prose & Prejudice (Points to Ponder)

It isn't about discrimination. And I promise I'm not in the bratty mood I was in one post ago. I'm just pondering classic literature. Oliver Twist, The Call of the Wild, Little Women to name just a few. To achieve that level of success. The proper word escapes me. Envy isn't quite right. Neither is jealousy. After all, I cut my teeth onthose four sisters and that dog, Buck. But those authors: the likes of Dickens, London and Alcott, Jane Austen, Stevenson. They make me sigh and say, "Wish I wrote that."
Also makes me wonder who our modern day classic writers are? Would Rowling fit the bill? Surely if sales are any indication. What then of Meyer, or Patterson or King?
Seems to me lately that the population of todays world is split into two types of people.
Those who write and those who don't.
Were that true then approximately 3 billion people are slumped over their keyboards at this very moment attempting to concoct a brand new way of saying the same old thing that's been said time and time again. And said VERY well at that. Is there really a novel way to spin a tale thats been spun and re-spun more than a hula hoop in the 1960's?
I wonder what the competition was like back in the days of Emerson and Irving? Was Whitman reading Tolstoy and thinking, "Damn, now that's good." Was Andersen mulling over Aesop with a "Why didn't I think of that?"

And now we return to our regularly scheduled programing. Unless you have Cable TV.
In that case we'll be back with you when we settle our financial wrangling.