Icelandic Sagas : heroic prose narratives of great families of Iceland in 930-1030; far in advance of any medieval literature in their realism, their controlled, objective style, their powers of character delineation, & their overwhelming tragic dignity.
... melodious,—though the incorrect method of writing them established by the old Indian scholars, often conceals their harmonious construction,—but no other praise can be given. The Nibelungenlied, the Icelandic Sagas, the Kalewala, the Homeric poems, were written in the dawn of civilisation by semi-barbarous races, by poets not superior in culture to the Vedic Rishis; yet though their poetical value varies ...
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