pathetic
- 1Provoking scorn or contempt, often by being miserably inadequate.
After all that hype, the fireworks show was pathetic: ten minutes of sputtering rockets.
Lying to your own grandmother to get money is pathetic.
UsageOften as a short verdict: That's pathetic. Said of a person to their face, it is a strong insult.
Similardisgraceful, shameful, despicable
Oppositeimpressive, admirable
Note
In Her Shoes (2005) draws the line in one breath: middle-aged tramps aren't cute, they're pathetic.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- In Her Shoes is a film released in 2005. en.wikipedia.org
- The quoted words occur in the film, spoken by Rose Feller. en.wikiquote.org
- 2Stirring pity, sympathy or compassion; full of pathos.
The refugees' pathetic bundles of belongings told the story of their long flight.
Her pathetic plea for her son's release moved even the guards.
UsageThe word can also express scorn, so let the context make the pity clear: a pathetic little cry.
Similarpitiful, sad, pitiable, tragic, wretched
Note
This is the kinder meaning, and the word's history explains it: through French and Latin from Greek pathētikós, "capable of feeling, impassioned," from páskhō, "to suffer." Writers of the 1880s used it for any moving scene; in H. Rider Haggard's She (1886–87), two dozing figures make "a pretty, or rather a pathetic, picture."
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 5 facts
- Pathetic derives through French and Latin from Greek pathētikós. en.wiktionary.org
- The Greek adjective has the meanings 'capable of feeling, impassioned'. en.wiktionary.org
- The derivation ultimately leads to páskhō, meaning 'to suffer', through the intermediate adjective pathētós. en.wiktionary.org
- H. Rider Haggard wrote She, first serialized during 1886–87; the British first-edition title page is dated 1887. en.wikisource.org
- The quotation accurately describes the sleeping Leo and Ustane; it occurs in the narrator's account. gutenberg.org
- 3In anatomy, the same as trochlear.
Similartrochlear
Note
In anatomy the word attaches to one nerve, the trochlear, which works the superior oblique muscle of the eye. Trochlear itself comes from the trochlea, a small pulley of tissue that the muscle's tendon runs through. Pity and contempt play no part here, and modern anatomy has replaced the term with trochlear nerve.
Less common meaning
- 4Showing or expressing anger; full of passion.
Similarangry, furious, enraged, irate, livid
Note
Older English could use the word for passion, anger above all, rather than pity, keeping close to the Greek "impassioned" behind the pitying meaning. The two can blur in older prose: in A. M. Clarke's The Life of Saint Francis Borgia (1894), a "moving and pathetic sermon" on Christ's sufferings may be read as both passionate and pitiful. Since a reader today hears only pity or scorn, leave this sense to old texts.
Checked 31 Oct 2026 · 4 facts
- Pathetic has an obsolete sense expressing anger or passion. en.wiktionary.org
- Pathetic ultimately derives from a Greek adjective meaning impassioned. en.wiktionary.org
- A. M. Clarke wrote The Life of Saint Francis Borgia, first published in 1894. fondazioneintorcetta.info
- Clarke describes a sermon on Christ's sufferings as moving and pathetic. fondazioneintorcetta.info
Practice
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Origin
Ancient Greek παθητικός (pathētikós, "impassioned, capable of feeling, subject to feeling") goes back to πάσχω (páskhō, "to suffer"). It passed into Latin as patheticus and into Middle French as pathétique, which English borrowed.