TO COTTLE
(10 January 1797).
My dear Cottle,
The lines which I added to my lines in the "Joan of Arc", have been so
little approved by Charles Lamb, to whom I sent them, that although I
differ from him in opinion, I have not heart to finish the poem.
"Mr. Coleridge in the same letter," says Cottle, "thus refers to his
"Ode to the Departing Year"."
* * * So much for an "Ode", which some people think superior to the
"Bard" of Gray, and which others think a rant of turgid obscurity; and
the latter are the more numerous class. It is not obscure. My "Religious
Musings" I know are, but not this "Ode".
Coleridge, in 1797, as in 1796, was invariably behind time with his
"copy" for the second edition. He thus writes Cottle:
LETTER 51. TO COTTLE
(Jany 1797).
My dear Cottle,
* * * On Thursday morning, by Milton, the Stowey carrier, I shall send
you a parcel, containing the book of my Poems interleaved, with the
alterations, and likewise the prefaces, which I shall send to you, for
your criticisms. * * *
LETTER 52. TO COTTLE
Stowey, Friday Morning (1797).
My dear Cottle.
* * * If you do not like the following verses, or if you do not think
them worthy of an edition in which I profess to give nothing but my
choicest fish, picked, gutted, and cleaned, please to get some one to
write them out and send them, with my compliments to the editor of the
"New Monthly Magazine".
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