I read the new translation, and try to recreate an earlier experience, when the text’s artful magic resonated with the real magic of Christmas, as I saw it. Alone with a pencil and those pristine pages, I sat by the bay windows, seeing people pass while Gawain accepted the challenge. But we cannot re-live moments: my mind fidgets, hears the chat around me, cannot choose what to focus on, as it asks, constantly, what is meaningful? Whenever I read I want to write, but everything might be a waste. I acquire books which lack the magic of that pristine moment.