📖 Meaning
A metaphor for the death or injury of a young woman. The willow and the flower are traditional Chinese images of feminine beauty and youth, so their breaking and withering symbolize a beautiful woman coming to harm. It is used almost exclusively in literary or elegiac contexts.
📜 Origin Story
The phrase comes from the Qing dynasty novel Dream of the Red Chamber (红楼梦), Chapter 78, by Cao Xueqin. In that chapter Jia Baoyu composes a lament for a young maid who died tragically, and the line reads '贼势猖獗不可敌，柳折花残血凝碧' — the enemy forces were fierce and irresistible, the willow snapped and the flowers withered, and blood congealed dark as jade. The image of broken willow and ruined flower was thus fixed as a poetic euphemism for a young woman's violent or untimely death.
💡 Example Usage
听闻这位才女英年早逝，不禁令人感叹柳折花残，天妒红颜。
Hearing that this talented young woman died before her time, one cannot but sigh that the willow snapped and the flower withered — heaven envies true beauty.
🏷️ Category
➕ Similar Idioms
➖ Opposite Idioms
🔤 Quick Facts
- Chinese: 柳折花残
- Pinyin: liǔ zhé huā cán
- Literal Translation: willow, broken, flower, withered
- Category: Condition
- Characters: 4