I read years ago about a 19th century American playwright who was the most popular of the time–late 1800s. His works were popular and critically lauded, but he is totally forgotten now and serves as an example of art not standing the test of time.
How about Augustin Daly? While he is completely forgotten today, he was very popular in his day and is the inventor of one trope that is still well-know today (even if it’s no longer used dramatically): tying someone to the railroad tracks from his play Under the Gaslight (though in the play it’s a man whose tied and a woman who rescues him).
Daly also supposedly invented the “tie victim to circular saw at a sawmill” trope.
I think it’s interesting that there’s not a single 19th century play by an American that anyone would put on today. Actually, just about the only playwrights anyone would put on today from that century are Shaw, Wilde, and Ibsen. Right?
I don’t think a week goes by that some theater group somewhere isn’t performing Edmund Rostand’s Cyrano de’Bergerac which was first performed in the 1890s.
That’s who I was going to say, Mr “It was a dark and stormy night”; he’s the one that I see used most often as an example of once-popular-now-forgotten writer. A man who’s remembered for not being remembered.