prefigure

That certainly wasn’t the first time a Leonard Cohen song seemed to prefigure events that had not happened, or to capture a global state of mind before it fully coalesced.

From Salon ● Jan. 21, 2025

But even as the spare language of her lines endows them with a monumental feel, their brevity and levity also prefigure the semiotically fraught short exchanges of the texting era.

From Washington Post ● Nov. 17, 2021

People who have received the shots two to four weeks earlier should watch for symptoms that may prefigure the onset of clotting.

From Seattle Times ● Jul. 13, 2021

They prefigure his retreat from music and now, his death.

From The Guardian ● Feb. 26, 2019

Gradually he put aside his perplexities concerning the future, permitting his mind to prefigure nothing but his duties with Landon at Meeker’s Mill.

From The Forester's Daughter A Romance of the Bear-Tooth Range by Hamlin Garland

The rumored price increases from Samsung were prefigured in a note on the stock by Citi analyst Peter Lee last week.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 6, 2026

This improbable gift was succeeded by a clock-radio—a Sony Dream Machine with a blue digital display in a sleek white cube that prefigured Apple’s austere aesthetic.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 11, 2026

He prefigured today’s globalized music economy long before it had language for itself, though his influence has often been oddly glossed over.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 25, 2026

Indeed, the epic “Rock Show” prefigured McCartney’s plans for conquering the rock ‘n’ roll box office.

From Salon ● Mar. 21, 2025

Mr. Houston, a farmer more prosperous and enterprising than his somewhat weedy appearance prefigured, beckoned Dr. Anna into the dining-room, where a sleepy but interested "hired girl" had brought hot coffee and sandwiches.

From Mrs. Balfame A Novel by Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton

That’s one way to start a book—bracing and bitter, conveying Mary Cain’s scorn for the athletic-shoe-and-sportswear giant while prefiguring her larger message that “sports normalizes cruelty.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 24, 2026

Smith was prefiguring a national movement that would open more roles to artists of color.

From Washington Post ● Jun. 10, 2022

You mention them as prefiguring the activism of the Freedom Summer.

From Salon ● Apr. 10, 2022

The Czech Republic’s fourth-wealthiest businessman, Mr. Babis first entered politics in 2011 and, prefiguring Mr. Trump’s cry of “drain the swamp” adopted the slogan of “end the political morass.”

From New York Times ● Oct. 9, 2021

So speaks Tiresias and is therein a kind of world-judge, prefiguring Minos of the last stage of Hades.

From Homer's Odyssey A Commentary by Denton Jaques Snider