It seems like the peasants used to eat lots of animal organs that now fall to the wayside (the wayside being kibble). A related fact is that the art of preparing those organ meats has been lost within family lines
My grandmother remembers her grandmother preparing liver, but she herself never picked up the skill. Thankfully, my wife and I were able to turn to the internet for preparation strategies.
Alternate explanation: Anything worth reprinting with multiple editions and updates over the years is likely to have been first written by an inspired and gifted writer. Any given editor is likely to lack the same pizzazz as the original author, and so over the years, the life of the work is likely to ebb away.
If you want to find great writing, perhaps you’re more likely to find it in the great first edition novels of our time, rather than in 30th edition updated texts which, for all I know, sell more on name recognition than anything else.