PREOCCUPATION • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Preoccupation

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/priˌɑkjəpˈeɪʃən/ Listen

Preoccupation

noun

An idea that preoccupies the mind and holds the attention.

The mental state of being preoccupied by something. Synonyms: absorption, engrossment, preoccupancy.

The act of taking occupancy before someone else does. Synonym: preoccupancy.

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Etymology of 'Preoccupation'

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"Preoccupation" Quotes from Famous Books

... How should they? Her thoughts were roaming in a world of her own, and her eyes were occupied in gazing upon her woman's pictures as she saw them in her mind. The wonders of that scene of natural splendor laid out before her had no power to penetrate the armor of her preoccupation. All her mind and heart were stirred and torn by emotions such as only a woman can understand, only a woman can feel. The ancient battle of titanic forces, which had brought into existence that world of stupendous might upon which her unseeing eyes gazed, was as nothing, it ...

— The Twins of Suffering Creek • Ridgwell Cullum

... economic development and an unprecedented reorganization of the army. There was also a reference to the new law for a return to three years' service which France was introducing to improve the efficiency of her peace establishment. But it was obvious that Russia was the main preoccupation. Germany had forced the pace both in the aggrandizement of her military strength and in the methods of her diplomatic intercourse. Suddenly she found herself on the brink of an abyss. She had gone too far; she had provoked into the competition of armaments ...

— Why We Are At War (2nd Edition, revised) • Members of the Oxford Faculty of Modern History

... is my work?" Brenton interrupted banally, for, in his secret heart, he was painfully aware that it was not the church alone which kept him so preoccupied that his preoccupation had come to be an occupation on its ...

— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray

... was to be remoulded in the form of antique sculpture. But it was also at this time, and owing to his stern apprenticeship to the study of form, that he acquired the mastery of drawing which served him so well when in the presence of nature; and with no other preoccupation than to reproduce his model, he painted the people of his time and produced his greatest works. For by a strange yet not unprecedented contradiction, David's fame to-day rests, not upon the great classical pictures which were the admiration of his time and by which he thought to be remembered, ...

— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various

... operatives, he must be somewhat of a disciplinarian. Is not that so, Clarisse?" and the old man turned to his wife, who, seemingly occupied with her dinner, paid no attention to him. A certain preoccupation was very evident. ...

— Jack - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

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