Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to criticize severely.

1899		Ade Fables in Sl. (1902) 160: The way he burned up Magazine Writers, it’s a Wonder they didn’t get after him for Arson.
1912		Ade Knocking the Neighbors 188: Albert was burning up the Local Aristocracy.

2. to annoy, to irritate, to aggravate; to get a person ‘hot under the collar’; thus as n. an annoyance.

1926		Maines & Grant Wise-crack Dict. 5/1: Burn him up – Arouse his anger.
1929		W. Winchell On Broadway 10 July [synd. col.] Among other burn ups last week was a telegram received by Al Jolson [...] the wire aggravated him no little.
1938		D. Runyon ‘Social Error’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 451: Miss Midgie Muldoon [...] looks right past Handsome Jack Maddigan, which burns Jack up all the more.
1944		H.B. Hersey G.I. Laughs 118: [cartoon] Ah, me! Wotta life—our sergeant burns me up.
1958		Murtagh & Harris Cast the First Stone 165: It burns them up not to be lords and masters in their own beds.
1965		(con. 1940s) Malcolm X Autobiog. (1968) 129: Burns them white folks up when you get youself something.
1978		P. Theroux Picture Palace 325: Yet it burned me up to think that they had come here to see each other and were not paying the blindest bit of attention to my pictures.
1987		T. Wolfe Bonfire of the Vanities 653: You know what burned me up? You were right. That was what burned me up.
1991		(con. 1920s) O.D. Brooks Legs 241: That burned me up.
1997		C. Newland Scholar 121: He jus’ burns me up.

3. to cut a swathe through.

1895		Bystander (Des Moines, IA) 27 Sept. 4/2: [He] subsequently ‘burned’ the money up — bucking the tiger’.
1899–1900		C.L. Cullen Tales of the Ex-Tanks 211: We had just burnt up Little Rock on that eighty-five dollars of mine.
1912		C. Mathewson Pitching in a Pitch 6: ‘So that is the guy who has been burning up this League, huh?’.
1920		Ade Hand-made Fables 31: All the other Trotters ducked to the Side-Lines and watched him burn up the Floor.
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 150: He burned up Rio while he was there.
1930		J. Lait Put on the Spot 39: He’s hot for the front-page copy. I could burn him up with it.
1946		S. Jackson An Indiscreet Guide to Soho 57: We have burned up headlines often before but this is the biggest front-page sensation of all.
1955		‘Hal Ellson’ Rock 94: There’s thirteen dollars in my pocket and we burned it all up on the rides.
1960		C. Cooper Jr Scene (1996) 227: These girls have been burning the business section up for the past month.
1974		Eble Campus Sl. Mar. 1: I really burned up that food.
1978		(con. WWII) T. Sanchez Hollywoodland (1981) 195: The Hollywood Stars were burning up [...] The crowd was hysterical with the scent of blood.
2004		J.A. Juarez Brotherhood of Corruption 79: Pearl Jam had just released a new album that was burning up the charts.

4. to excite.

1923		N. Anderson Hobo 61: They are burning up to learn something on their own hook; and they’ll learn it, too.
1969		N. Cohn Awopbop. (1970) 52: We also fall in love and that really burns us up.
2000		(con. 1940s–60s) Décharné Straight from the Fridge Dad.

5. to outdo, to surpass.

1926		M. West Sex (1997) I i: Won’t I burn up the janes when I wear this!
1927		R. Lardner ‘Hurry Kane’ in Coll. Short Stories (1941) 94: Then Dave soft-soaped him, told him how he’d burn up the league.
1970		B. Jackson Get Your Ass in the Water (1974) 218: You know I got some Jap Zeros do very well, / but Uncle Sam got some P-38s burn up old hell.

6. to become annoyed, furious, esp. underpinned by embarrassment.

1929		J. Lait Broadway Melody 45: A whole page! And in the medium where all the performers would read and realise—and burn up.
1933		J.T. Farrell Gas-House McGinty 354: Jake Schaeffer, he yells ... I smell manure somewhere. Cunningham burns up.
1935		E. Freeman ‘The Whirling Hub’ in Afro-American 8 June 18/2: Simmie Roberts and Cellus Stokes burned up at made protests.
1942		W.R. Burnett Quick Brown Fox 212: ‘You’re burning up because he married Alison’.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 37/1: Burn up. 1. To become enraged.
1959		W. Brown Teen-Age Mafia 70: He was burning up, ready to blow a fuse.
1973		L. Bangs in Psychotic Reactions (1988) 124: Meanwhile, Angie is burning up about the way Jerry’s gawking at that near-nekkid hoofer lady.
1998		K. Sampson Awaydays 65: Elvis simply isn’t there, hasn’t spoken, doesn’t exist. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen Elvis burn up.

7. (US tramp) to betray one’s partner to the police.

1931

Irwin Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 43: Burn Up: To ‘frame up’ another, since the victim is said to be ‘burned up’ when he grows ‘hot under the collar’ at the treatment received.

8. to be under intense police pressure.

1931–4		D. Clemmer Prison Community (1940) 332/2: A town or reso may have so much ‘heat’ directed up it that it is described as ‘burning up’.
1973		E. Bunker No Beast So Fierce 267: Man, you’re burning up. You shouldn’t be here.

9. to draw attention to.

1971

D. Goines Dopefiend (1991) 37: He didn’t want any dopefiends burning up his house.

10. see burn v. (2a)

11. see burn v. (5d)

12. see burn out v. (2)