hungry, adj. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

hungry adj.

[intensified version of SE hungry, ‘having or characterized by a strong desire or craving’ (OED)]

1. ambitious, enthusiastic, driven.

1862		in Civil War Hist. VIII (1962) 378: [...] our troops [...] were hungry and mad and desperate and fought like tigers [HDAS].
1916		J. Lait ‘Charlie the Wolf’ in Beef, Iron and Wine (1917) 47: The guns is mighty hungry and roughhouse this year.
1927		D. Hammett ‘$106,000 Blood Money’ Story Omnibus (1966) 323: Said you were [...] hungry as hell for this Papadoodle.
1947		B. Schulberg Harder They Fall (1971) 172: Don’t be so shoving hungry.
1967–8		Baker et al. CUSS 141: Hungry Eager for or looking forward to something or someone.
1975		D. Goines Inner City Hoodlum 202: Joe and Eddie-Bee were hungry, and would do anything for Duke.
1999		K. Sampson Powder 80: It was a young, hungry outfit but they were notoriously picky about the bands they took on.
2002		C. Stella Jimmy Bench-Press 130: The guy’s hungry is all. He’s been away.
2014		Stormzy ‘Shut Up’ 🎵 Look, I was out hungry, so damn hungry / Man tried eat then leave me the bones.
2020		G. Krauze Who They Was 12: I’m always hungry, even though I’ve got p’s stacked, but I always want mopre.

2. (Aus.) mean, grasping, stingy, obsessed with money; often used as a nickname, e.g. Hungry Scott.

1901		J. Flynt World of Graft 25: Of the police courts in Chicago there is not much that I have to report as coming from the Under World, save the alleged fact that they are extremely ‘hungry’.
1943		W.R. Burnett Nobody Lives for Ever 224: ‘Damn! I’ve seen some hungry guys in my day: but lawyers get all the marbles!’.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 104/2: Hungry. Money-mad, especially for bribes, protection sums.
1963–74		B. Humphries Barry McKenzie [comic strip] in Complete Barry McKenzie (1988) 14: Jeez, what a hungry lot they are in there! They just about fleeced me!
1973		(con. 1930s) F. Huelin ‘Keep Moving’ 4: We’ll bite the butcher and baker as we go in [...] They’re a hungry mob but we’ll give ’em a go.
1986		R.G. Barrett Real Thing 155: You’re not the only hungry cunt in Australia.
1986		R. Beckett Dinkum Aussie Dict. 30: Hungry bastard: Someone who will stop at nothing to get an extra quid (dollar). Someone who would steal the stamp money from his blind mother. A shithead.
2012		‘Dutch’ ? (Pronounced Que) [ebook] KG tried to keep them hungry, giving them petty percentages while he G’d off with the lion’s share.

3. (US campus) sexually excited.

1904		Lustful Memoirs of a Young and Passionated Girl 50: I too was going to experience the supremest pleasures of having that red-headed champion of him in my body, feel it pulsating and throbbing as it filled and stretched the delicate folds of my hungry receptacle.
1967–8		Baker et al. CUSS.
1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular 110: hungry 1. (euphemism for cock hungry) greedy, wanting ever more; sexually ungratified. hungry girl = promiscuous homosexual.
1989		P. Munro Sl. U.
2016		A. Wheatle Crongton Knights 19: ‘You always go on too hungry around fit girls’.

4. (US drugs) in need of narcotics.

1954

E. Hunter ‘. . . Or Leave It Alone’ in Jungle Kids (1967) 56: You were hungry last night [...] Where’d you score?

In compounds

hungry croaker (n.) [croaker n.⁵ (1)]

(drugs) a doctor who, for one reason or another, is willing to prescribe drugs for any user who asks for them.

1969		R.R. Lingeman Drugs from A to Z (1970).
1971		E.E. Landy Underground Dict. (1972).
1983		R. Klein Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.].
2002		T. Nordegren A-Z Encyc. Alcohol and Drug Abuse 344: Hungry croaker Colloquial term for physician who prescribes drugs for cash.

SE in slang uses

In compounds

hungry-belly (adj.)

(W.I.) esp. of children, starving, malnourished.

1977

Congos ‘Fisherman’ 🎵 Lots of hungry-belly picknies be at home.

hungry mile (n.)

(Aus.) a stretch of Sussex Street, Sydney, frequented by dockers in search of work.

1930		E. Antony Hungry Mile 5: They toil and sweat in slavery, ’twould make the devil smile, / To see the Sydney wharfies tramping down the hungry mile [AND].
1957		T. Nelson Hungry Mile 75: The stretch along Sussex Street was called the ‘Hungry Mile’ by the wharfies [...] a very apt title indeed [GAW4].
1967		‘Whisper All Aussie Dict.’ in Kings Cross Whisper (Sydney) xxxv 6/2: hungry mile: A length of Sussex Street in Sydney frequented in the early days by out of work men.
1973		Sydney Morning Herald 2 Aug. 7: When I was much younger the ‘Hungry Mile’ of Sydney waterfront was an area of glamour [GAW4].
1974		J. Gaby Restless Waterfront 245: I pounded the old Hungry Mile.

hungry track (n.)

(Aus.) a section of the road on which a vagrant finds it hard to find either food or work.

1941

K. Tennant Battlers 33: Talking and smoking and comparing ‘handouts’ and ‘bites’ and good towns and ‘hungry tracks’.

In phrases

hungry enough to eat the ass out of a (dead) skunk (also hungry enough to eat the ass hole out of a bear, ...the maggoty arse out of a dead bandicoot)

(Can.) very hungry; also in vars.

1958		(con. 1950) E. Frankel Band of Brothers 224: I’m so hungry I could eat the ass-end out of a skunk.
1983		Ken Weaver ‘More Texas Crude’ in CoEvolution Quarterly Spring 🌐 Hungry . . . enough to eat the ass out of a menstruating skunk. 1. I’d rather die.
1986		R.G. Barrett Godson 96: I’m bloody hungry. I’d eat the maggoty arse out of a dead bandicoot’.
2002		Kenneth C. Goldman ‘A Pound of Flesh’, on Bloodlust – UK 🌐 I seen you earlier too when you chewed at my face like you was some pit bull hungry enough to eat the ass hole out of a bear! That weren’t no bad-assed mo’fuck I saw earlier, J-Bird. That was some kind of snap case demon, one whipped up crazy.
2002		Re Ba HumorMeOnline.com 🌐 Really Bad Cookbooks [...] ‘SOOOOOOOEEE! I’m Hungry Enough to Eat the Ass Out Of A Dead Skunk!’ Southern Cooking Made Easy.