Dictionary

burn the candle at both ends en · VERB

Etymology

Calque of French brûler la chandelle par les deux bouts. First attested in the 18th century, originally in the sense “to be doubly profligate”.

Meanings

1. (idiomatic) To work hard night and day; to sleep late and wake up early; to overwork or overexert oneself.
   • I don’t look older, I just look worse, I think. Honestly, when I’m walking down the street, no one’s ever like, “Hey, look at that man!” I think they’re just like “Whoa! That tall child looks terrible! Get some rest, tall child! You can't keep burning the candle at both ends!" 2012, John Mulaney, 0:01:05 from the start, in John Mulaney: New in Town:
   • Von Gerhard's face was unsmiling. “So,” he said, slowly. “You burn the candle at both ends. All day you write, is it not so? And at night you come home to write still more? Ach, Kindchen!—Na, we shall change all that. […] 1911, Edna Ferber, chapter 8, in Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed:
2. (dated, idiomatic) To waste or expend resources twice over; to be doubly profligate.
   • And another thing not to be forgotten is that the expense rate, the cost of production, has kept pace with the reduction in premiums, thus burning the candle at both ends; […] 1892 February 17, H. M. Grant, “What Do We Learn?”, in Proceedings of the Sixteenth Annual Meeting of the Fire Underwriters’ Association of the Pacific, published 1892, page 154:
   • Speaking financially, Mrs. Ormsby had burned the candle at both ends. Her establishment was costly on the one hand; her pleasures costly on the other. 1905 March, William Hamilton Osborne, “The Transfer of Thorneycroft”, in The Smart Set, volume 15, number 3, page 95:
   • Now the Department of the Interior is trying to burn the candle at both ends by narrowing the margin of profit and at the same time cutting down the amount of production. 1963, Karl Bradshaw, “Statement of Karl Bradshaw, Duckwater, Nev.”, in Review of the Taylor Grazing Act: Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Public Lands […] United States Senate, Eighty-Eighth Congress, First Session […], page 318:
   • The dividends […] were divided from capital and not from profit—for, in truth, the concern never earned a penny in the sense in which the term profit is commonly employed. […] The pipe-making concern burned the candle at both ends, and burned it steadily; […] 1866 May, “Large and Small Companies”, in The Bankers’ Magazine […], volume 26, pages 530–1:
   • Oceana is a world younger than our own, wedded to a star with but a fraction of the life expectancy of Sol. It is a world burning the candle at both ends, enjoying twice the light in half the time, and spinning all the faster toward annihilation and the Void. 1989, Dragon Wars (video game manual), Interplay Productions, page 1:
   • From what I hear, he's a regular dog; he's rolling in money; he's taking three mistresses and a cook along with him. All these great artists burn the candle at both ends; they require a dissolute life, that stirs the imagination to some extent. 1886, Gustave Flaubert, chapter XIV, in Eleanor Marx-Aveling, transl., Madame Bovary: Provincial Manners […], London: Vizetelly & Co., […], →OCLC, part II, pages 241-242:

Forms

Relateds

the candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long · not worth the candle · burn the midnight oil

Translations (15)

hu két végén égeti a gyertyát (work hard night and day) · ru рабо́тать на изно́с (work hard night and day) · fr brûler la chandelle par les deux bouts (work hard night and day) · pt matar-se de trabalhar (work hard night and day) · ru горе́ть на рабо́те (work hard night and day) · fi polttaa kynttilää molemmista päistä (work hard night and day) · cmn 夙興夜寐 /夙兴夜寐 (work hard night and day) · pl pracować od świtu do nocy (work hard night and day) · fi polttaa kynttiläänsä molemmista päistä (work hard night and day) · es quemar la vela por los dos cabos (work hard night and day) · sv bränna sitt ljus i båda ändar (work hard night and day) · ja 過重労働 (work hard night and day) · ar حرق الشمعة من كلتا طرفيها (work hard night and day) · it bruciare la candela ad entrambe le estremità (work hard night and day) · pt dar um duro danado (work hard night and day)