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FOR DEAR LIFE
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| IPA (US): |  |
Dictionary entry overview: What does for dear life mean?
• FOR DEAR LIFE (adverb)
The adverb FOR DEAR LIFE has 1 sense:
1. as though your life was at stake
Familiarity information: FOR DEAR LIFE used as an adverb is very rare.
Dictionary entry details
Sense 1
Meaning:
As though your life was at stake
Context example:
he was running for dear life
Context examples
What a moment that would be when the suspicions of his followers turned to certainty and he and I should have to fight for dear life—he a cripple and I a boy—against five strong and active seamen!
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
'Ha! Ha!' laughed the ghost, and having peeped through the keyhole at the princesses spinning away for dear life, the evil spirit picked up her victim and put him in a large tin box, where there were eleven other knights packed together without their heads, like sardines, who all rose and began to...
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
Often I have heard the house shaking with Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum, all the neighbours joining in for dear life, with the fear of death upon them, and each singing louder than the other to avoid remark.
(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
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