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Fatidical

Adjective
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Describing language or prophecy that is oracular, foreboding, or divinely inspired, often carrying weighty, fateful implications.

Detailed Definition
Fatidical describes language or prophecy that is oracular, foreboding, or doom-laden, often associated with seers, sibyls, or divine revelation; in poetry, fatidical tone evokes inevitability and cosmic fate through archaic diction, rhythmic incantation, and ominous imagery—as in Macbeth’s witches or Shelley’s "Ode to the West Wind" (“If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”)—imbuing the verse with prophetic authority and existential weight.
Example
Example in poetry:
Shakespeare’s witches in “Macbeth” deliver fatidical utterances: “Beware the ides of March”; T.S. Eliot’s “The Waste Land” includes fatidical fragments (“I will show you fear in a handful of dust”); fatidical language conveys prophetic or doom-laden authority; in “Oedipus Rex,” the oracle’s words are fatidical; contemporary poet Tracy K. Smith uses cosmic voices in “Life on Mars” as fatidical commentary; this mode blends inevitability and mystery.
Additional Notes
Prophetic, predictive in nature. "Fate-speaking" literally. Related: prophetic verse, oracular poetry. Rare term. Study: how poetry claims or questions prophetic authority.
Also Known As
prophetic oracular
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