bathetic

Nov. 30th, 2009 07:42 am
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[personal profile] prettygoodword
bathetic - adj., displaying or characterized by bathos: having an abrupt, usually unintended, change in style from high to low, especially to anticlimax, insincere pathos, triteness.


Bathos was coined in 1727 by Alexander Pope or one of his coterie, used in a strict stylistic sense, by borrowing Greek βάθος (bathos) meaning depth, in contrast to ὕψος (hypsos), sublimity -- the image being the bathetic parts are a drop into the deeps. It was quickly expanded into the metaphoric uses, but bathetic itself wasn't used until 1830 or so. Pronounced bah-THEH-tik

---L.

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