Bathos
Noun
- (Especially in a literary work) An effect of anticlimax created by an unintentional lapse in mood from the sublime to the trivial or ridiculous.
Example Sentences
“The influencer’s video about world hunger descended into bathos when she started promoting her new protein shake.”
“The heartfelt wedding vows had an unexpected moment of bathos when the groom’s ringtone interrupted the ceremony.”
“The ridiculous climax in the play left the audience with a deep sense of bathos.”
Word Origin
Greek, mid-17th century
Why this word?
An anticlimatic finale can ruin even the most popular shows. The finale of the fantasy show “Game of Thrones,” for example, instilled such a deep sense of bathos in so many viewers that positive discussion of the show disappeared almost overnight. While this noun originated in ancient Greek to mean “depth,” it found modern context in the 17th-century writings of Alexander Pope, an influential English poet.
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