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All Site ContentMidsummer Night's DreamAct 3Scene 2
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"Hang off"
Language
Act 3,
Scene 2
Lines 260-263

An explanation of the phrase “Hang off” in Act 3, Scene 2 of myShakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Demetrius

But yet come not. You are a tame man, go.

Lysander

[To Hermia] Hang off, thou cat, thou burr . Vile thing, let loose,
Or I will shake thee from me like a serpent.

Hermia

Why are you grown so rude? What change is this,

Today we often use the expression "hang on," but never its opposite "hang off" (let go). In Shakespeare's time they did.