tearjerker
See also: tear-jerker and tear jerker
English
[edit]Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From tear + jerker, so termed because it suggests one is likely to cry during its performance.
Pronunciation
[edit]Noun
[edit]tearjerker (plural tearjerkers)
- (informal) An emotionally charged film, novel, song, opera, television episode, etc., usually with one or more sad passages or ending.
- 1990, Wayne Jancik, The Billboard Book of One-Hit Wonders, →ISBN, page 338:
- Renamed in honor of the tube tearjerker, the work wondrously went on to become the most recognized theme in all of soapdom.
- 2003, Steven Pinker, How the Mind Works[1], Penguin, →ISBN:
- The psychologist Paul Rozin lumps tearjerkers with other examples of benign masochism like smoking, riding on roller coasters, eating hot chili peppers, and sitting in saunas.
- 2019 January 26, Kitty Empire [pseudonym], “The Streets review – the agony and ecstasy of a great everyman”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian[2], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 8 April 2019:
- The many tear-jerkers deal with finality, with death and the end of love, with a stoicism pregnant with feeling.
Related terms
[edit]Translations
[edit]emotionally charged dramatic work
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