afire - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

13thc., from Middle English afire, equivalent to a- (“on”) +‎ fire. Figurative usage from late 14thc.[1]

afire (comparative more afire, superlative most afire)

afire (comparative more afire, superlative most afire)

1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii], page 3:
Ariell: […] all but Mariners / Plung'd in the foaming bryne, and quit the veſſell ; / Then all a fire with me the Kings ſonne Ferdinand / With haire vp-ſtaring (then like reeds, not haire) / Was the firſt man that leapt ; cride hell is empty, / And all the Diuels are heere.
1856, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Aurora Leigh, New York: C.S. Francis & Co., 1857, Seventh Book, p. 275[1]:
[…] Earth’s crammed with heaven, / And every common bush afire with God:
1931, Nacio Herb Brown and Gordon Clifford, “Paradise” (song first sung by Pola Negri and later covered by Nat King Cole and Frank Sinatra):
Her eyes afire / With one desire. / Then a heavenly kiss: / Could I resist?
1950, Mervyn Peake, chapter 63, in Gormenghast, London: Eyre & Spottiswoode:
Old claw-like hands, cracked with long years of thankless toil, would hold aloft a delicate bird of wood, its wings, as thin as paper, spread for flight, its breast afire with a crimson stain.
ablaze
aflame
chimney's afire
like a house afire
set afire
set the world afire

literally on fire

afire