Green’s Dictionary of Slang

crazy, insane, eccentric.

1881		Jewish Chronicle (London) 12 Aug. 10/2: This dialect generally known by the name of Judisch-Deutsch [...] furnishes a clue to several entirely non-German expressions and phrases that are currently used in South Germany,such as uzen (to banter), meschugge (crazy), schote (fool), schlimmassel (ill-luck), schlemihl (an awkward person), &c.
1892		I. Zangwill Children of the Ghetto 156: She’s meshuggah — quite mad!
1899		A. Binstead Houndsditch Day by Day 26: D’ye mean to say as you ’ad no buyers [...] What’s come to ’em — mershugga?
1901		M. Wolfenstein Idyls of the Gass (1969) 21: What nonsense, the way she makes herself meshugge (crazy) with that Yungel (little lad)!
1915		Eve. Public Ledger (Phila., PA) 11 Dec. 24/1: Because [...] You Say Dot Roosevelt and Taft are Not Good friends, You’re Meshuga.
1920		N.Y. Tribune 28 Mar. 22/5: I thought he was gone meshuga, which I mean that he was bugs.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 152: His loose jaw wagging as he spoke earnestly. Meshuggah. Off his chump.
1925		Mencken letter 7 Nov. in Riggio Dreiser-Mencken Letters II (1986) 543: Tom Smith is mashuggah.
1927		‘J.M. Hall’ Anecdota Americana I 47: He’s a business man and his rating is O. K. But he’s eppis a little meshuga.
1936		San Quentin Bulletin in L.A. Times 6 May 7: MESHUGA, crazy.
1941		A. Kober My Dear Bella 216: Because I’m meshugeh, that’s why!
1952		(con. 1920s) ‘Harry Grey’ Hoods (1953) 343: He [...] shouted after me in Yiddish, ‘Meshuggeneh merder.’.
1959		B. Kops Hamlet of Stepney Green II ii: I don’t like saying this, Bessie, but your boy is meshuga.
1961		J. Kirkwood There Must Be a Pony! 238: I also told myelf I was – in Jay’s language – ‘Mishoogena!’ [sic].
1961		(con. c.1935) R. Poole London E1 (2012) 23: ‘Vhy you fightink? [...] is all meshuggeh’.
1963		A. Baron Lowlife (2001) 17: Now this is mad. It is stone bonkers meshuggah.
1965		R.L. Pike Mute Witness (1997) 70: You never did anything meshuga before.
1968		Kerouac letter 4 June in Charters II (1999) 452: I may be mashuganish but I’m still not yet a schmuck.
1977		P.-D. Uys Paradise is Closing Down in Gray Theatre One (1978) 152: Here I am. Molly Mashuga with as her best friends, a Boer and a Shiksa.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 221: I even chased Davey away when those meshugeneh brothers came calling!
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 248: Meshuga wig! He reached up to snatch it off.
1999		T. Parker South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut [film script] The woild is such a rotten place / And city life’s a complete disgrace / That’s why I moved to this redneck, meshuggenah, quiet mountain town.
2000		M. Amis Experience 235: I should remind myself of the ordinary misery of the the thing, the meshugga ill luck of it.
2001		(con. 1975–6) E. Little Steel Toes 113: Mein Gott, are ya meshugenah? Lookatcha, no fuckin’ front teeth.
2005		Mad mag. Apr. 31: You’ll hav to excuse my wife, Razz, she’s a little mushuggeneh.
2017		Tablet 9 Jan. 🌐 f Jewish Democrats think their party will be a welcoming place for them, [...] with a former associate of the Nation of Islam as its chairman, they’re meshuggah.
2019		P. Baker Fabulosa 294/2: meshigener crazy.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 4: My meshugenah march down memory lane begins now .
2023		R. Milward Man-Eating Typewriter 4: I am an uly man, a meese meshigena-omi.