For DIckens, I'm totally with you. His style doesn't suit modern tastes at all, and I'm unclear on why he continues to be well regarded. Shakespeare, though, is absolutely accessible to modern audiences and still very good, when read correctly; unfortunately, grade school English teachers rarely do, and most people never have any other experience with him. The language can be a small stumbling block, but the comedies particularly have very little that actually gets in the way (also, you can assume anything you don't understand is a sexual pun, and you'll be right about 80% of the time). To be fair, I'm a linguistics geek and may enjoy the archaic double-entendres more than most, but Beatrice and Benedick's snark-sniping in Much Ado About Nothing remains hilarious regardless of culture.