Let's go with the grain of tidal power | Brief letters

Fictional Leros | Tidal power in the 18th century | Feast | AA salute | Interpreters v translatorsFurther to your travel feature on the Greek island of Leros (9 June), may I recommend to your readers Four's Destiny: A Wartime Greek Tragedy by Michael Powell, a fictionalised account centring on Leros. Powell weaves a clever, powerful story around some fascinating wartime history. We follow four young men, one each from England, Germany, Italy and Greece, as the second world war changes their lives and destinies. Ruth SamuelsBishop's Stortford, Hertfordshireo Re the proposed Swansea Bay tidal power lagoon (Letters, 11 June), the tidal-powered grain mill on the River Lea at Bromley-by-Bow in London was economic from the 1700s to the 1930s - and without the super-efficient bearings common in today's machinery. Such small-scale hydro-powered generators (tidal and river) should be all over the country - they'd provide work and be far less expensive than nuclear. But some city slickers won't be so able to extract their rent from localised generation so it won't be approved by UK's present government.Robin Le MareAllithwaite, Cumbria Continue reading...