cast a long shadow

cast a long shadow

To continue to have consequences well into the future. A: "I know I made a mistake, but that happened years ago! Why are we still talking about it?" B: "Because old sins cast a long shadow."
See also: cast, long, shadow
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

cast a long shadow

COMMON If something or someone casts a long shadow over something or someone, they have a great, long-lasting influence over them, usually a bad one. It was a time of hardships and the war still cast a long shadow over life in England. Cancer has cast a long shadow over almost every family in the country.
See also: cast, long, shadow
Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed.
See also:
  • get away with murder
  • cost (someone) dearly
  • dearly
  • He who rides a tiger is afraid to dismount
  • He who rides a tiger is afraid to dismount.
  • be heading for a fall
  • come from a good place
  • funeral
  • it's someone's funeral
  • be (someone's) funeral
References in periodicals archive
The devastation the loss of jobs wrought on too many communities continues to cast a long shadow.
PICTURE THIS..
But risk factors at 50 cast a long shadow. Some 67 percent of men and 57 percent of women with diabetes at 50 are likely to have heart or vascular problems by age 75.
To predict your odds of future heart disease, look back in time
2 Pierre Huyghe, "Streamside Day Follies" (Dia: Chelsea, New York) Streamside Day, 2003, Huyghe's film-within-an-installation, was winding down its Dia run when the ball dropped on 2003, but its performative daredevilism cast a long shadow across the year ahead.
Best of 2004: 13 critics curators look at the year in art
Southwestern Seminary since its infancy as a theological department at Baylor University in 1905 has cast a long shadow over Southern Baptist life.
The Legacy of Southwestern: Writings that Shaped a Tradition
"The awful accidents at Southall, Ladbroke Grove and Hatfield continue to cast a long shadow over the rail industry", said Rail Passengers' Committee for Wales secretary Clive Williams.
Report on rail safety greeted
Fortified with robust UltraSPARC(TM) II processors, 16 GB of main memory and 218.4 GB of storage, the UNIX(R)-based Sun Enterprise 4500 cast a long shadow over previously reported results.
SUN ENTERPRISE 4500 SERVER TAKES NOTESBENCH WEBMAIL TO HEIGHT OF SCALABILITY
Updated from time to time, such views continue to cast a long shadow, as evidenced by the reception of films such as American Beauty (whose protagonist, in the words of one representative critic, bravely struggles "to awaken from the stupor of 20 years in the suburbs") and the new book Suburban Nation (whose subtitle announces two simultaneous and equally horrible trends: "The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream").
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