Word.ws English Dictionary

set one's hair on fire

set one's hair on fire verb: to become wildly impassioned; to behave crazily.

Verb

set one's hair on fire (third-person singular simple present sets one's hair on fire, present participle setting one's hair on fire, simple past and past participle set one's hair on fire)

  1. (idiomatic) To become wildly impassioned; to behave crazily.
    • "It was perceived that we were opening a party house where people could drink and run amok and generally set their hair on fire," said Bill Hobson, executive director of the Downtown Emergency Service Center.2009 March 31, Vanessa Ho, “Study: Seattle home for alcoholics saved taxpayers $4 million”, in Seattle Post-Intelligencer, retrieved 22 Sep 2017
    • [T]he problem is the extreme shortage of affordable housing. You can do as the city has decided to do, which is set up a task force to deal with affordable housing. . . . Or you can set your hair on fire and blame Chinese foreigners.2012 April 5, Allen Garr, “Blaming Chinese for high house prices in Vancouver is racist”, in Vancouver Courier, Canada, retrieved 22 Sep 2017
    Synonyms:
    freak out, lose it

Synonyms of set one's hair on fire

Forms of set one's hair on fire

third-person singular presentsets one's hair on fire
present participlesetting one's hair on fire
past participleset one's hair on fire
pastset one's hair on fire
alternative formlight one's hair on fire
alternative formrun around with one's hair on fire

Origin of set one's hair on fire

Possibly from stories of Viking marauders said to have set their hair and beards on fire when running into battle in order to appear fanatical and fearsome.

Words formed from set one's hair on fire

Questions about set one's hair on fire

What does set one's hair on fire mean?
Set one's hair on fire means to become wildly impassioned; to behave crazily.
What part of speech is set one's hair on fire?
Set one's hair on fire is a verb.
What is the past tense of set one's hair on fire?
The past tense of set one's hair on fire is set one's hair on fire.

Words near set one's hair on fire in the dictionary

  1. set on fire
  2. set on foot
  3. set one's affairs in order
  4. set one's cap at
  5. set one's face against
  6. set one's hair on fire
  7. set one's hand to
  8. set one's heart on
  9. set one's heart upon
  10. set one's house in order
  11. set one's shoulder to the wheel

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: set one's hair on fire (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-set one's hair on fire.ogg.

Cite this entry: “set one's hair on fire.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/set_one%27s_hair_on_fire. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.