excitement

I

(New American Roget's College Thesaurus)

State of being excited

Nouns

1. excitement, excitation; stimulation, piquancy, provocation, arousal, incitement; animation, agitation, perturbation; intoxication, high pressure; exhilaration, passion, thrill, flame. Informal, charge, boot, jolt, charge, kick. Slang, high, buzz, rush, jollies. See violence.

2. (excited situation) fever, commotion, to-do, buzz, dither, fluster, bustle, hurly-burly, hullabaloo, pandemonium, furor[e], upheaval, frenzy, alarums and excursions; rut, orgasm (see sex). Informal, tizzy, lather.

3. excitability, turbulence; exuberance, effervescence, ebullition.

Verbs

1. (excite to action) excite, move; strike, interest, animate, enliven, inspire, impassion, stir or warm the blood; awaken, evoke, provoke; raise, arouse, stir; fire, get going, [en]kindle, set on fire, inflame, fan the flames, heat, warm, foment, raise to fever heat. Slang, rev up, jazz up, rattle someone's cage, yank someone around or someone's chain.

2. (make excited) stimulate, inspirit, stir up, elate, work up, sharpen, spice, whet, incite, give a fillip, put on one's mettle; stir or play on the feelings; touch a chord, go to one's heart, touch to the quick; intoxicate, electrify, turn one's head, carry or sweep off one's feet, carry away, warm the blood. Slang, turn on.

3. be excited, flare up, catch fire; flush, pale, turn color; work oneself up, lose one's grip; seethe, boil, simmer, foam, fume, rage, rave (see excitability).Informal, race one's motor, blow one's top. Slang, flip [out], get off on, cream one's jeans, wig out, go ape, go bananas, freak out.

Adjectives

1. excited; worked, keyed, or wrought up, on the qui vive, in a quiver, in a fever, in hysterics; black in the face, overwrought; hit, flushed, feverish; all atwitter; flaming, boiling [over], ebullient, seething, foaming [at the mouth], fuming, raging; wild, frantic, mad, hectic, distracted, beside oneself, out of one's mind or wits, ready to burst, stung to the quick. Informal, hot and bothered, gung ho, antsy. Slang, switched on, ape-shit.

2. exciting, warm, glowing, fervid, swelling, heart-stirring, thrilling; striking; soul-stirring, spine-tingling, agonizing, sensational, hysterical; overpowering, overwhelming, piquant, spicy, heady, provocative, tantalizing. Informal, mind-blowing, happening.

Adverbs — excitedly, excitingly, in a dither, all agog; with bated breath.

Quotations — Chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit (Henry Adams), It is not merely cruelty that leads men to love war, it is excitement (Henry Ward Beecher).

Antonyms, see indifference, inexcitability.

II

(Roget's IV) n.

Syn. agitation, confusion, disturbance, tumult, enthusiasm, eagerness, ferment, trepidation, turmoil, stir, excitation, animation, hurry, perturbation, excitedness, delirium, furor, rage, exhilaration, emotion, stimulation, arousal, drama, melodrama, thrill, activity, commotion, ado, fuss, hullabaloo, bother, dither, hubbub, fluster, flutter, flurry, bustle, to-do, tizzy*; see also thrill .

Ant. peace*, calm, quiet.

III

(Roget's 3 Superthesaurus) n.

agitation, stimulation, furor, arousal, electricity, passion, enthusiasm, energy, titillation, sensation, frenzy, tizzy, fever, commotion, ferment, *fireworks, flurry, *kicks, perturbation, tumult, *hubbub, *hullabaloo, *white heat, *to-do, *hoopla.

ANT.: somnolence, dormancy, boredom, stagnation

IV

(Roget's Thesaurus II) noun Intensity of feeling or reaction: excitation, heat, warmth. See EXCITE, FEELINGS, HOT.