Answer:In this quote, the author sees literature as a way to gain experience and avoid making certain mistakes. She views it as instruction from our past messages left for us to use and apply. In the quote it states "Listen to them!" referring to the authors of literature implying that listening could keep us from death.
In this passage, Willis is expressing that literature is a message from the past telling us about the lives of those before us. We are told that these messages are trying to tell us how we live and how we die based on others experiences. Willis tries to explain this through a concerned, yet passionate tone that urges us, the readers, to learn from the mistakes and the fortunes of the lives of people before us. We can only do this through literature, as it is the gateway to seeing how the world works.
