like mad

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English

Prepositional phrase

like mad

  1. Like a mad person; in a furious or deranged manner; to a great or excessive degree; with great enthusiasm.
    We poked a stick into the hornets' nest and ran like mad.
    • 1567, George Turberville (translator), The Eglogs of the Poet B. Mantuan Carmelitan, London, “The .vj. Egloge,”[1]
      They neuer linne to scrape our goodes
      till all our wealth be gone.
      Which if we chaunce to sée,
      excuses then are had:
      But so we sée not when ’tis done,
      they will denie like mad
      They neuer toke away
      one iote but was their owne:
    • 1667, Roger L’Estrange (translator), The Visions of Dom Francisco de Quevedo Villegas, London: H. Herringman, “The Seventh Vision of Hell Reform’d,” p. 258,[2]
      The Devils fell upon the Damn’d; and the Damn’d fell upon the Devils, without knowing One from t’other: and all running helter-skelter, to and again, like Mad; for in fine, it was no other then a general Revolt.
    • 1741, Samuel Richardson, Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded, London: for the author, Volume 4, Letter 17, p. 118,[3]
      There were divers Antick Figures, some with Caps and Bells, one dress’d like a Punch; several Harlequins, and other ludicrous Forms, that jump’d and ran about like mad; and seem’d as if they would have it thought, that all their Wit lay in their Heels.
    • 1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick, Chapter 16,[4]
      When Bildad was a chief-mate, to have his drab-coloured eye intently looking at you, made you feel completely nervous, till you could clutch something—a hammer or a marling-spike, and go to work like mad, at something or other, never mind what.
    • 1993, Roddy Doyle, Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, Penguin, p. 210,[5]
      I’d laughed. He’d laughed. Mine lasted the longest. During it, I thought it was going to change into a cry. But it didn’t. My eyes blinked like mad but then it was okay.

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