Analyzing and Interpreting Literature / Unit 3 AIL 0217 short lesson, about 20 seconds
"Prevent" Means Go Before
Captions available
The idea
Sonnet one hundred closes "Give my love fame faster than Time wastes life, So thou prevent'st his scythe and crooked knife". To prevent is to get ahead of, to forestall by arriving first. The poet outruns Time rather than stopping it, which is a different and more anxious claim.
In practice
Prevent is to arrive first.
Where people slip
Stopping and outrunning are not the same claim.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
Builds on
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