I've been reading through the syllabus for Professor Philomenes' Introduction to Literature in hopes of catching up a bit on local culture. I just finished the Pre-Modern section, which included The Tale of Arcturus. It's a fascinating piece, remarkably similar in style to the Beowulf that I read as a freshman. The style in which the author constructs metaphor, the alliteration, even the debate over provenance bear striking resemblance to one another.
One of the early things I learned about magic in my world was this: stories are immutable, like gold. It's fascinating to see proof of it--the details in Arcturus are different, but the core of it is nigh identical to Beowulf.
It makes me wonder if we're all stories, and Vallo some dedicated collector of special editions. Which one of you is the 1937 author-illustrated printing of The Hobbit?