Expanding Vocabulary

Today, December 1, 2008, Ned Rorem, the ridiculously unreasonable critic of modern music (or any music but his own) essay Against Rock, taught me a new, useful, and intelligible word! BATHETIC: it is derived from the Greek word ‘bathos’ meaning to depth, but in regards to poetry it supposed refers to ‘bad’ poetry, or on a more positive note (pun intended, since this is for a music & language class…) it refers to outrageously performed and/or written poetry. This is how crazy Mr. Rorem uses the term. he claims that Mary Baker Eddy uses “bathetic stanzas… [that] promote[d] and function[ing] precisely like rock, are as effectively persuasive to another large group”. Yeahhhh, I don’t know what he is talking about, but if YOU do, please let me know? cool beans