Definition of "unawares" []

• By surprise; unexpectedly: "Sorrow comes to all, and to the young it comes with bittered agony because it takes them unawares” ( Abraham Lincoln). (adverb)
• Without forethought or plan. See Usage Note at unaware. (adverb)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Using cameras to observe students unawares is definitely unethical and probably illegal, though we may have to wait for a court to decide that."
• "When she had made an end of combing it, she plaited my tresses, and my beauty and loveliness charmed her; so she bent over me and kissed my cheek. 334 At that moment he came in unawares, and, seeing the girl kiss my cheek, straightways turned away in anger, vowing eternal-separation and repeating these two couplets,"
• "Such a record as his, such a look in the eyes, the expression unawares of a life of sustained effort -- always in one direction "--"