Pathetic

Pathetic

Adjective · /pəˈθet.ɪk/

Definition

(1) Arousing pity or sadness; evoking compassion through suffering, inadequacy, or helplessness — the pathetic figure of the homeless child; a pathetic cry for help. (2) (Informal, dismissive) miserably inadequate; contemptible; worthy of contempt rather than pity — a pathetic excuse; that's just pathetic; his effort was pathetic. (3) (Archaic, literary) relating to or expressing the emotions — the pathetic fallacy.

Origin

From Late Latin patheticus, from Greek pathētikos (capable of feeling, affecting the emotions) — from pathos (suffering, experience, emotion) and pathētos (capable of feeling), from paschein (to suffer, to experience). Pathetic therefore originally meaning capable of arousing or expressing feeling — the sense being one of emotional power. The pejorative dismissive sense developing from the nineteenth century as the word's emotional meaning became associated specifically with pitifulness and inadequacy.