Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US drugs) under the influence of drugs; thus hop oneself up v., to take drugs.

1918		Hi Simons ‘Prison Dict.’ in AS VIII:3 28/1: HOPPED UP. In a stupor from drugs.
1921		O.O. McIntyre Bits of New York Life 20 Feb. [synd. col.] With ether, bad booze and veronal, Broadway is getting all hopped up.
1924		G. Henderson Keys to Crookdom 86: When ‘hopped up’ on coke, even an honest person plans all kind of wild acts.
1927		(con. 1918) J.W. Thomason Red Pants 164: It’s Charley, and he’s all hopped up.
1930		E.H. Lavine Third Degree (1931) 227: Many of the newer generation of ‘coked’ or ‘hopped up’ gunmen will shoot and kill a merchant because they don’t like the look of his face.
1938		E. Hoffman Price ‘Revolt of the Damned’ in Double-Action Gang June 🌐 Smoke Keenan, hopped up and reckless, had staged the reprisal.
1947		N. Algren Neon Wilderness (1986) 250: He didn’t have time to argue with hopped-up dames.
1953		E. Hunter ‘Vicious Circle’ in Jungle Kids (1967) 34: I thought Turk was just hopped and talking through the top of his skull.
1957		C. Himes Imabelle 78: ‘You think she’s drunk?’ [...] ‘Either that or hopped’.
1965		J.P. Carstairs Concrete Kimono 61: I realized he had been hopped-up, probably on P.H.s.
1965		C. Himes Rage in Harlem (1969) 77: [as 1957].
1965		T. Wolfe Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby (1966) 6: Hopping himself up with good old amphetamine [...] then hooking down more alcohol.
1970		D. Mitchell Thumb Tripping (1971) 130: Those guys are all hopped up on pills and shit.
1981		M. Baker Nam (1982) 163: The plan was to feed us, get us all hopped up, and have a big old time.
1996		(con. 1949) G. Pelecanos Big Blowdown (1999) 211: She’s all the way hopped.
1999		P. McCabe Mondo Desperado 14: A mother who’s a hopped-up swimsuit model in some squalid pit of sexual depravity!
2001		(con. 1964–8) J. Ellroy Cold Six Thousand 123: A bunch of hopped-up niggers looking for their next fix.
2010		(con. 1973) C. Stella Johnny Porno 69: Twelve hours ago, hopped up on a speedball he’d injected under his tongue, Billy had killed a man.
2020		S.A. Crosby Blacktop Wasteland 173: These boys didn’t look like hopped-up meth heads.

2. (US) in fig. use, excited, impatient, obsessed with.

1920		T.A. Dorgan in Zwilling TAD Lex. (1993) 46: They’re not gettin’ out an extra — we gotta new editor an’ the boys are kinda hopped up.
1923		H.C. Witwer Fighting Blood 122: The more I think about it, the more I get hopped up on the idea.
1937		D. Fuchs Low Company 23: He had almost made it when that hopped-up gambler had to bust in as though it were a fire.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 59: He was all hopped up, cracking wise, acting big buying drinks for the house.
1952		J. Jones From Here to Eternity (1998) 122: He worked savagely, taking out his hatred on the paper [...] throwing himself headlong at it like a hopped-up Jap attacking a machinegun.
1961		M. Braly Felony Tank (1962) 73: I’m sorry, man. I’m all hopped up.
1965		Worlds of If Nov. 139/1: They are getting hopped on murder.
1967		(con. 1940s) M. Dibner Admiral (1968) 314: How come a renegade Catholic like you is so hopped up on the Lord?
1967		J. Rechy Numbers (1968) 11: The hopped-up disc jockeys making bad jokes.
1973		E. Droge Patrolman 171: He was really getting me hopped up about the idea.
1977		J. Sayles Union Dues (1978) 337: Mark [...] was so hopped and horny with the whole thing.
1983		R. Price Breaks 26: We’d be hopped up, leaping, flying, diving, you name it.
2001		A. Sillitoe Birthday 91: That’s because you’re hopped up all the time.
2010		J. Ellroy Hilliker Curse 20: I got hopped up on the Black Dahlia murder case.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 305: That sick twist Jimmy Dean was all hopped up to play Chessman.

3. (US) crazy.

1934		R. Sale ‘A Nose for News’ in Goulart (1967) 205: You’re hopped [...] You’re staggering. Forget it. I wouldn’t go in on a plan like that for money.
1967		A. Baraka Tales (1969) 79: Five or six hundred hopped-up woogies tumbled out into Belmont Avenue.
1976		R. Price Blood Brothers 151: Butler was jumping around like a hopped-up rooster.
1983		S. King Christine 472: Two fucking million Japs coming at us hopped to the eyeballs.
2002		J. Ellroy ‘Little Sleazer & the Mail-Sex Mama’ in Destination: Morgue! (2004) 167: It’s a hopped-up heap of hopeless hope.
2007		S. Maloney Sucked In 169: He’s all hopped up [...] Mad as a cut snake.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 35: The meshugenah Magna Carta of our hopped-up and fucked-up age.

4. (US) embellished, ‘jazzed up.’.

1941		B. Schulberg What Makes Sammy Run? (1992) 77: Sammy is an unusual model [...] With a special hopped-up motor.
1952		C. Hamilton Men of the Und. 133: With this hopped-up pace have come new criminal tricks.
1960		J. Havoc Early Havoc 228: The show was a sort of hopped-up version of Earl Carroll’s Vanities.

5. (US) of a car, improved beyond its basic specifications, thus v. hop up.

1947		Devil Thumbs a Ride [film script] Say, this baby really rolls along, is she hopped up?
1955		‘Blackie’ Audett Rap Sheet 54: The Stutz could run rings around that Studebaker, even though I had it all hopped up.
1966		H.S. Thompson Hell’s Angels (1967) 165: He kept a hopped-up 1937 Ford with no fenders.
1978		S. Longstreet Straw Boss (1979) 211: The hopped-up car was a little difficult to handle.
1998		(con. 1986) G. Pelecanos Sweet Forever 15: It was a boxy GM, a Monte carlo or the hopped-up version of the Cutlass.
2001		G. Pelecanos Right As Rain 47: She [...] watched Earl and ray leave the barn and head for their car, a hopped-up Ford.
2017		T. Pluck Bad Boy Boogie [ebook] [A] kid in a hopped-up Civic.
2018		T. Pluck ‘Hot Rod Heart’ in Life During Wartime 98: He unbent the frame, hopped up the engine, and drove it to every drag strip he could find.

6. in adv. use.

1963

in T.I. Rubin Sweet Daddy 9: She’s so hopped up happy someone wants her.