It might be the other way around. We ignore the classics because we think we can reinvent everything, and they seem like old, impossible, superseded dust.
My Dad read the ancient classics. That got me to read some, been hooked since then.
Much later I read something else that has stuck with me. It goes something like this;
“Times and things change but people don’t. “
Read Book VIII of Plato’s Republic, where the descent into tyranny from democracy is discussed.
I believe it is a hallmark of Modernism that we need new things all the time. Anything from the past (a thousand years? Two hundred years? Five years?) can’t possibly be as good as the thing that came out last month.
It is the essence of building on quicksand and refusing to learn from any past successes or failure.