hell-bent for leather
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.81 in modern English
29
Scrabble Score
18
Letters
5
Syllables
10
Unique Chars
Meaning
adv
adv
Synonym of hell-for-leather (“very fast”).
adv
Synonym of hell-bent (“(recklessly) determined”).
Example Sentences
- "[...] his Supply Officer was hell bent for leather to torpedo his tour as the Commanding Officer and wanted explanations, or at least reassurances."
- "She had been through several programs, to no avail; nothing worked, she was hell-bent for leather, she was intent on hurting herself."
- "“Gosh!” said Marking. “Where the hell did the Japs get that? [...Was that] a Jap plane? God damn, it was fast.” And I agreed, “It was hell-bent for leather some place.”"
- "It had been quite some piece of road from an eastern region of Arizona to SOD, but Jethro was hell-bent for leather. His desire for a meeting with Zelda Klemp had taken him over. He'd been driving since late the previous night ..."
- "I was determined not to be a back seat driver. I said nothing. I waited patiently for her to stop hugging the berm to keep distance from fast moving traffic. I waited for three thousand miles. She was hell bent for leather to get to our destination, ..."
Etymology
Apparently a blend of hell-bent + hell-for-leather, though sometimes said to have been initially applied to animals which behaved poorly as if they were bent on being turned into leather.