adjective
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a pathetic/lame excuse (= very weak )
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That’s the most pathetic excuse I’ve ever heard.
pathetic fallacy
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
how
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All Theda's earlier resentment faded with the onset of pity. How pathetic a creature she was, poor Lady Lavinia!
rather
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It was rather pathetic , like an ageing colonel looking back on the days of Empire.
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Alien in themselves, they represent a rather pathetic attempt to enliven city centres which are essentially lifeless.
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It was rather pathetic sometimes because he was upset at somebody going down on a discipline charge and getting the sack.
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Not a bad achievement, especially when compared to humankind's rather pathetic four hundred thousand.
so
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Or maybe it hadn't been so pathetic .
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Louis Blues and wonder why he was so pathetic in Los Angeles last season.
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Some time later, near home-time, I don't find it so pathetic .
■ NOUN
attempt
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What a contrast with the pathetic attempts by Mr Major and Norman Lamont to blame others for their coming public spending cuts.
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It is a pathetic attempt to institutionalize dysfunction and to establish an idol.
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Alien in themselves, they represent a rather pathetic attempt to enliven city centres which are essentially lifeless.
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Afterward, Mr Dent walks him home, shares a nightcap and makes a pathetic attempt at seduction.
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A pathetic attempt to use proto-scientific methods to ascertain and then apprehend the transcendent.
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To be truly modern means to accept the process of change without pathetic attempts to prevent it from running its course.
excuse
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Crowe offered a pathetic excuse about investigating woodworm infestation for his nature column, but I soon beetled the truth out of him.
fallacy
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It was all just like a pathetic fallacy .
figure
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Clowns in the social world of soccer fans, are the pathetic figures who will never make it.
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But it still remains significant that some of the pathetic figures are to be found on funerary urns.
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She thought he looked a pathetic figure of a man.
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A pathetic figure , to be sure.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
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pathetic images of half-starved children
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a pathetic attempt at seduction
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I can't believe we wasted our money on that pathetic comedian last night.
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She's clever, but as a teacher she's pathetic .
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The movie's special effects are absolutely pathetic .
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There is something pathetic about a 40-year-old man who still has his mother do his laundry.
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We found a small dog sitting outside the back door, looking pathetic .
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Yang looked at me with a pathetic expression on his face.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
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And she found it interesting that Sandra would project her own pathetic pursuit of Matthew on to some one else.
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But each day the silence worked on me-and my pathetic longing.
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Even worse, it sounded pathetic .
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How pathetic they had seemed at the time, how weak, their eyes blazing with fear, like trapped animals.
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I just felt pathetic , ashamed, embarrassed and ugly.
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It was really pathetic , meeting him like that in the flower shop.
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The arrogance of some of the has-beens in the Athletico squad is pathetic .