I have read the suggestion that one should avoid reading newly published books and focus on those at least 10 years old. The premise being that if they are still around then, well, they must be worth reading. It is so expensive to publish a book that it is more and more common for print runs to be very short. No publisher or bookseller wants to be landed with hundreds of copies of a book that they cannot shift.
I’m not sure what the definition of a ‘classic’ is but maybe it is that it never goes out of print. Think of Jane Austen, the Brontes and maybe now the whole Harry Potter oeuvre.
‘Slightly Foxed’ the literary review and small publishing house, and Persephone Books in Bath both have an agenda of sorts which is to republish books that they deem to be forgotten. In the case of Persephone Books the focus is very much on women writers.
All well and good and I enjoy the fruits and recommendations of both but I won’t be put off reading something that is new, even if in the end it does not stand the test of time. It is fun to await a new Elly Griffiths, Susan Hill, Tracy Chevalier or Elif Shafak, so, no, I won’t be told what to read. I like a wide and varied reading diet and just as in food, I think variety is good for me.