Aristotle said that the point of art was to achieve catharsis.
Source: tatoeba (7063516)
Catharsis
//kəˈθɑːsɪs//
Synonyms for "catharsis" (54 found)
Ranked by relevance and common usage.
Closest matches (11)
Strong matches (16)
Related words (27)
Related word relations
OpenGloss and ConceptNet supply richer edges like generalizations, collocations, and derivations.
More general
2 entriesRelated terms
1 entriesderived
2 entrieshas context
4 entriesis a
1 entriesrelated to
17 entriesShowing 16 of 17 words.
Translations
58 translations across 28 languages.
Ancient Greek
1 entries- κάθαρσις noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Arabic
1 entries- تَنْفِيس noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Bulgarian
1 entries- катарзис noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Catalan
2 entries- catarsi noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- catarsi noun (any release of emotional tension)
Chinese Mandarin
2 entries- 宣洩 /宣泄 noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- 導瀉 /导泻 noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Czech
1 entries- katarze noun (psychology: therapeutic technique)
Danish
2 entries- katarsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- katarsis noun (any release of emotional tension)
Faroese
1 entries- reinleikan noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Finnish
4 entries- katarsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- katarsis noun (any release of emotional tension)
- katarsis noun (emotional purification)
- katarttinen terapia noun (psychology: therapeutic technique)
French
3 entries- catharsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- défoulement noun (any release of emotional tension)
- défoulement noun (psychology: therapeutic technique)
German
2 entries- Katharsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- Katharsis noun (any release of emotional tension)
Greek
3 entries- κάθαρση noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- κάθαρση noun (any release of emotional tension)
- κάθαρση noun (psychology: therapeutic technique)
Hebrew
1 entries- קתרזיס noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Hindi
1 entries- तनफ़ीस noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Hungarian
3 entries- katarzis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- katarzis noun (any release of emotional tension)
- katarzis noun (psychology: therapeutic technique)
Icelandic
1 entries- geðhreinsun noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Ido
1 entries- katarso noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Italian
2 entries- catarsi noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- catarsi noun (any release of emotional tension)
Japanese
4 entries- カタルシス noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- 排出 noun (any release of emotional tension)
- 浄化 noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- 発散 noun (any release of emotional tension)
Māori
1 entries- whakamaheatanga noun (any release of emotional tension)
Polish
3 entries- katharsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- katharsis noun (any release of emotional tension)
- katharsis noun (psychology: therapeutic technique)
Portuguese
2 entries- catarse noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- catarse noun (any release of emotional tension)
Russian
4 entries- ка́тарсис noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- ка́тарсис noun (any release of emotional tension)
- ката́рсис noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- ката́рсис noun (any release of emotional tension)
Serbo-Croatian
4 entries- katarza noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- katarza noun (any release of emotional tension)
- катарза noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- катарза noun (any release of emotional tension)
Slovak
1 entries- katarzia noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Spanish
2 entries- catarsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- catarsis noun (any release of emotional tension)
Swedish
1 entries- katarsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
Turkish
2 entries- katarsis noun (drama: release of emotional tension)
- katarsis noun (psychology: therapeutic technique)
Sample sentences
3 total sentences available.
They need a sense of catharsis.
Source: tatoeba (11505316)
True, as the show has entered its later years, there have been more inspired moments of catharsis, but fewer unpredictable arcs and story beats, as a narrative nearing its conclusion is no longer attempting to shock.
Source: wiktionary
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.