pathos

pa·thos

noun
\ˈpā-ˌthäs, -ˌthȯs, -ˌthōs also ˈpa-\

Definition of PATHOS

1

: an element in experience or in artistic representation evoking pity or compassion

2

: an emotion of sympathetic pity

Examples of PATHOS

1. Our knowledge of his tragic end adds an element of pathos to the story of his early success.
2. There is a pathos to the deflated certainties that left the Washington lawyer Leonard Garment weeping, inconsolable, outside the Senate chamber as the debate was ended. —Garry Wills, New York Times Book Review, 10 Sept. 1989
3. The struggle back to solvency was arduous, and the stubborn determination and reserves of strength that it called forth from him in his mid-forties made him all at once a figure of considerable pathos and heroism in my eyes, a cross of a kind between Captain Ahab and Willy Loman. —Philip Roth, Reading Myself and Others, (1961) 1975
4. Many schools at the end of the Depression were poor, but the threadbare nature of Christchurch was almost Dickensian in its pathos. —William Styron, This Quiet Dust and Other Writings, (1953) 1982

Origin of PATHOS

Greek, suffering, experience, emotion, from paschein (aor. pathein) to experience, suffer; perhaps akin to Lithuanian kęsti to suffer

First Known Use: 1591

Other Literature Terms

apophasis, bathos, bildungsroman, bowdlerize, caesura, coda, doggerel, euphemism, poesy, prosody

Rhymes with PATHOS

bathos, benthos, bugloss, chaos, Chios, cosmos, Delos, demos, Ellás, emboss, en masse, Eos, epos, Eros, ethos, Hyksos, kaross, kudos, kvass, Lagos, Laos, Laplace, Lemnos, Lesbos, Logos, Madras, Melos, mythos, Naxos, Nepos, nol-pros, nonpros, peplos, Pharos, pit boss, pothos, ringtoss, Samos, Skyros, straw boss, telos, topos, tripos