However, in creating such lists, texts by their contemporaries are overlooked or cast aside. By means of this sort of literary natural selection the fittest or most worthy texts may survive the auspices of time, whilst the text that is slightly lacking or weak in substance is left behind. It would not be possible or desirable to produce a list that simply contained all the works of authors over time, so a list must be created by disseminating texts by their "goodness- .
Texts become increasingly reproducible if they are popular with the readers who receive them. It is in the nature of literature to understand texts in terms of personal responses and therefore it seems almost offensive to feel that the literary canon is predetermined for us by others who are more privileged and right. One of the prevailing grievances of the critics is the idea that the canon was solely devised by and for an elitist group of white male aristocrats; "The gatekeepers of the fortress of high culture including influential critics, Museum Directors and their boards of trustees and far more lowly school teachers- . who have castigated texts by female writers and oppressed texts from ethnic minorities and lower classes to found what we now know as the western tradition of literature. Arguably these factors have helped the canonical classics become more susceptible to printing because the most powerful members of society have the capitol to perpetuate the works they feel most worthy. It would be nave in comparison to believe that several members of the working class in the Nineteenth Century could from their cotton factory promote a book to canonic status, yet popularity from the masses would make reproducibility possible. Certainly stories serialised at first in the tabloids, such as Uncle Tom's Log Cabin, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, did reach popularity with the working class and critics alike. Likewise, driven by the intrigue of the pseudonym, the Bronte sisters remained members of the canon even after it was discovered that Ellis, Acton and Currer Bell were women.
