Meanings
- idiomaticnot comparableImpassioned; eager; wild; crazy; rage-filled; frantic.
[T]he most common reactions to Ryan ranged from gnawing apprehension to hair-on-fire anger.
2012 August 14, Tom McCarthy, “U.S. Politics: Paul Ryan heads west as convention slate unveiled”, in Guardian, UK, retrieved 22 Sep 20173 more examples
Almost no singer in rock enunciates better, and he used that skill to make noise: teeth-and-tongue clucking, gut-punch bellows, hair-on-fire shrieking.
2003 September 9, Ben Ratliff, “Music Review: Fluttering Rat-a-tats to Celebrate a Birthday”, in New York Times, retrieved 22 Sep 2017I’ve made something of a career in debunking nonsense when it comes to science, from people who think the Moon landings were faked to hair-on-fire UFOlogists who think every lens flare and dust mote in a photo is the precursor to an alien invasion.
2016 December 16, Phil Plait, “Trump Adviser Turns the Anti-Science Up to 11”, in Slate, retrieved 22 Sep 2017This race [between Susan Crawford and Brad Schimel, for a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court] wasn’t the only contest of the night that suggested that Democrats are hair-on-fire to vote.
2025 April 2, Cameron Joseph, “Democrats’ big election night gives them first hope since Trump’s victory”, in The Christian Science Monitor
Cite this entry
hair-on-fire. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hair-on-fire
“hair-on-fire.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hair-on-fire. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “hair-on-fire,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/hair-on-fire.
Source: hair-on-fire on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.