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/pˈeɪθɑs/ Listen

noun

Pathos n. That quality or property of anything which touches the feelings or excites emotions and passions, esp., that which awakens tender emotions, such as pity, sorrow, and the like; contagious warmth of feeling, action, or expression; pathetic quality; as, the pathos of a picture, of a poem, or of a cry. "The combination of incident, and the pathos of catastrophe."

The quality or character of those emotions, traits, or experiences which are personal, and therefore restricted and evanescent; transitory and idiosyncratic dispositions or feelings as distinguished from those which are universal and deep-seated in character; opposed to ethos.

Suffering; the enduring of active stress or affliction.

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Etymology of 'Pathos'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Pathos" Quotes from Famous Books

... That tender pathos, which could sink so deep—that gentle humor, which could soar so lightly—that delicate perception, which nothing could escape—that wide sympathy, which ranged so far—those sweet moralities, which rang so true; it is indeed hard and sad to feel that these must be silent ...

— The Land of Thor • J. Ross Browne

... and again the odd pathos, the childishness of the whole thing stirred Trix's heart. She said she understood, and she did understand more profoundly than Nicholas could possibly have conceived. In the few seconds of silence which followed, she reviewed ...

— Antony Gray,--Gardener • Leslie Moore

... already shipwrecked, others foundering for want of a pilot; and he wonders not at their destruction, but at their endurance. For they ought to have perished long ago, if they had depended on the wisdom of their rulers. The mingled pathos and satire of this remark is characteristic of Plato's ...

— Statesman • Plato

... American fancy. It struck. Mr. Wodehouse had tried his wings here only a few months when magazine editors were bidding for his manuscripts. His short stories have appeared generally in the magazines, and while one often finds the delightful touch of pathos, there is always an abundance of laughter. In Cosmopolitan, Collier's Weekly, Ainslee's, and many other publications these stories appear as often as Mr. ...

— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck

... color, the flavor, the movement of life in "the quarters," in the cotton field and in the canebrake. Even in this effort, white authors had led the way; Irvin Russell and Joel Chandler Harris had made the path straight for Paul Laurence Dunbar, with his lilting lyrics, often infused with the pathos ...

— Fifty years & Other Poems • James Weldon Johnson

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