bathetic

English

Etymology

From bathos +‎ -etic, based on the form of pathos and pathetic.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /bəˈθɛtɪk/

Adjective

bathetic (comparative more bathetic, superlative most bathetic)

1. Characterized by or pertaining to bathos.
   • 1995, Rupert D. V. Glasgow, Madness, Masks, and Laughter: An Essay on Comedy, page 214:

     The fall is indeed the archetypal bathetic motion, a sudden, surprising downward rush degrading the pretensions of posture and man's bipedal pride.

   • 2003 December 13, Harold Bloom, “The knight in the mirror”, in The Guardian‎^[1]:

     To ask what it is that Don Quixote himself believes is to enter the visionary centre of his story. This curious blend of the sublime and the bathetic does not come again until Kafka, another pupil of Cervantes, would compose stories like "The Hunter Gracchus" and "A Country Doctor".

   • 2012, Andrew Martin, Underground Overground: A passenger's history of the Tube, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 20:

     It is possible that Shillibeer's bathetic end is the reason buses did not become universally known as 'Shillibeers'. Some operators had called their buses Shillibeers.

Derived terms

• bathetically

 

References

• “bathetic”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.