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ON FIRE
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Lighted up by or as by fire or flame
Example:
houses on fire
Synonyms:
ablaze; afire; aflame; aflare; alight; on fire
Classified under:
Similar:
lighted; lit (set afire or burning)
Context examples:
The Baronet will never set the Thames on fire, but there seems to be no harm in him.—reciprocal compliments, which would have been esteemed about equal.
(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)
How much more must an imaginist, like herself, be on fire with speculation and foresight!—especially with such a groundwork of anticipation as her mind had already made.
(Emma, by Jane Austen)
His first thought was that Oz had by accident caught on fire and was burning up; but when he tried to go nearer, the heat was so intense that it singed his whiskers, and he crept back tremblingly to a spot nearer the door.
(The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum)
I heard the word Burglum repeated incessantly: several of the emperor’s court, making their way through the crowd, entreated me to come immediately to the palace, where her imperial majesty’s apartment was on fire, by the carelessness of a maid of honour, who fell asleep while she was reading a romance.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
We are on fire with anxiety and eagerness.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
“The castle is taken and on fire, the seneschal is slain, and there is nought left for us.”
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
Your fifth house, which is so lit up, also rules your creative efforts, and this month—and most of the year—you will be on fire.
(AstrologyZone.com, by Susan Miller)
“A house on fire?” asked Bradstreet as the train steamed off again on its way.
(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
"Lingerer!" he said, "my brain is on fire with impatience, and you tarry so long!"
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
Also the chimney on fire, the parish engine, and perjury on the part of the Beadle.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
