bathos
pronunciation
How to pronounce bathos in British English:
UK [ˈbeɪθɒs]
How to pronounce bathos in American English:
US [ˈbeɪθɑs]
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- Noun:
- triteness or triviality of style
- insincere pathos
- a change from a serious subject to a disappointing one
Word Origin
- bathos
- bathos: [18] Bathos, the descent from the sublime to the commonplace, means etymologically ‘depth’. It represents Greek báthos, a derivative of the adjective bathús ‘deep’ (which has also given English such technical terms as bathyal ‘of the deep sea’, bathymetry, bathyscaphe, and bathysphere). The use of the word in English seems to have been initiated by the poet Alexander Pope (1688–1744), in his Bathos.
- bathos (n.)
- "anticlimax, a descent from the sublime to the ridiculous," 1727, from Greek bathos "depth," related to bathys "deep" (see benthos). Introduced by Pope.
Example
- 1. Michael page 's approach goes for bathos .
- 2. And in reading their requests the bathos of the ultimate penalty is impossible to ignore .