Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) and Nature’s Divine Participation: Reverence for the One and the Many in the Scientific and Poetic Imagination

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I enjoyed this greatly, and have no criticisms to make. You might note, however, a few typos which i have recorded in the text.

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Thank you very much for your feedback and noting the typos in the text. I have corrected them according to the PDF you attached. I have also learned that my copy of Coleridge's Opus Maximum incorrectly calls it Opus Maximus on the cover, but Maximum throughout the text, so I am glad to be alert to that misprint on my end.

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Typographical/grammatical error in abstract (lines 9-10): 'First, I will establish Coleridge’s the influence of Platonic and Neoplatonic thought on his philosophical system.'

Unclear phrasing (line 10): 'I will show how this tension works out in' - unclear which tension is being referred to or what is meant by 'works out'.

Capitalise 'romantic' (line 12).

Phrasing (line 24): ' the poem as one that comes alongside its readers' - unclear what is meant by this.

Replace abbreviation with full word (line 28): 'ad'.

Present tense (line 34): describes.

Typographical/grammatical error (line 42): 'over' or 'against'

Missing 'a' (line 69): before 'good-natured dismissal

Discussion of 'nonsense' (lines 73-75), especially in relation to Coleridge, could benefit from engagement with Andrew McInnes's research. Research outputs from his project The Romantic Ridiculous are listed here: The Romantic Ridiculous — Edge Hill University

Unclear phrasing/sentence structure (lines 76-8): 'he continued to hold together this tension of the world studied objectively, the “not self,” and subjectively experienced as “I am.”'

Grammar (line 78): 'As Thomas McFarland summarizes this tension in Coleridge'.

Rephrase (line 83): the nuance of

Section 2 on Coleridge's Platonism is clearly argued and engages well with some critical responses but there is no mention of James Vigus's work which really ought to be included in any study of Coleridge's Platonism. His book Platonic Coleridge (Oxford: Legenda, 2009) is the key text to read, and he has also published several articles on Coleridge's Platonism and philosophy. 

Coleridge's mediation between Christian theology and Platonic/Neoplatonic philosophy is also discussed by E. Douka Kabitoglou in Plato and the English Romantics (London: Routledge, 2013), Natalie Tal Harries in 'The Sublime of Man: Neoplatonic Interactions in Coleridge's Religious Musings' in Romantic Dialogues and Afterlives (Jagiellonian University Press, 2020), and Tim Fulford in '"Living Words": Coleridge, Christianity and National Renewal', Prose Studies (15:2, 1992).

References/quotes to support argument on Coleridge seeing philosophy as a group project? (lines 137-141)

Typographical/grammatical error (line 143): 'over' or 'against'

Change to present tense (line 154): 'argued'

You may find Seamus Perry's Coleridge and the Uses of Division (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999) a useful resource for the third section (especially the discussion of polarity etc.).

Grammar (lines 334-5): 'There are the ways in 334 which polarity manifests in humanity’s physical activities, particularly in trade and literature.'

Unclear what 'forgotten name' refers to (line 347).

Clarify what you mean by 'It' (line 348): 'It may also be the answer...'

Closing discussion in section 3 (lines 359-371) may benefit from reference to  'The Eolian Harp' as it contains a poetic formulation of Coleridge's argument here.

Word order (line 413): 'to him unknown' - 'unknown to him'

Critical context/responses provided for Christabel but not for the Rime

Typo (line): 'write' should be 'writes'

Consider restructuring the poetry analysis (lines 397-529) so that your reading of the Rime is presented in full followed by your reading of Christabel, in order to present a sustained analysis of each poem rather than jumping between the two. As you provide a comparative reading of both in relation to the Essays on Method from line 530 onwards I think restructuring the preceding analysis in this way would strengthen this section.

I appreciate that the incorporation of some of these suggestions would result in a higher word count and I am unsure how many words you have at your disposal. If you need to trim any of the existing sections in order to make way for expansion elsewhere I would suggest shortening the plot summaries of the poems. I appreciate that they are necessary as readers of this journal may not be familiar with Coleridge's poetry but you do not need to provide too much detail, just enough to ensure that there is appropriate context for your analysis.

Generally very well written but there are some minor errors that require correction (see above). Good engagement with critical context in some respects but there are some areas where a greater degree of engagement with critical responses to the concepts being discussed would be beneficial. The suggestions above are not recommended citations but examples of relevant research that you should familiarise yourself with as they relate to the concepts being discussed. However, you do not need to incorporate them all, only anything you find in them that you think it is appropriate to reference. The exception to this is James Vigus' Platonic Coleridge. I really think this should be cited given the topic of your article.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Minor errors noted in the comments above.

Author Response

Please see the attachment. Thank you for your careful and attentive corrections, revisions, and directions to further scholarship.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf