As in the film Invasion of the Body Snatchers, with its spiritually dead, clonelike pod people, M.'s reaction to his real or imagined encounter with extraterrestrials comes to symbolize the dehumanization and de-emotionalization of contemporary life--the willful denial of connection to other humans and the avoidance of introspection.

Now NR is examining other trouble spots where rock armour could work, such as stretches of flood-prone track near Abergavenny and Machynlleth.

He was able to add largely to the existing stores of Johnsoniana, and Dr. Hall, Dr. Harwood, Lord Rokeby, Lord Stowell, Sir James Mackintosh, Sir Walter Scott, and many others, give him valuable memoranda.

They are simple, but majestic, records of the feelings of the poet; as little tricked out for the public eye as his diary would have been.