A version of Zhong's coercivity result for a general class of nonsmooth functionals (Q1854117)

A generalized Ekeland's variational principle and a coercivity result was established by \textit{C.-K. Zhong} [Nonlinear Anal., Theory Methods, Appl. 29, 1421-1431 (1997; Zbl 0912.49021)] for nonsmooth functionals by an asymptotic approach. The present authors prove that Theorem 2.3 in the paper can not deduced from Zhong's corresponding result (i.e. Theorem 3.7 in Zhong's paper). Based on Ekeland's variational principle, a new relation between the Palais-Smale condition and coercivity is established.