Enough patient effort will get you there
The gap between those first two lines is the whole point of a chengyu. It is quoted whole, never assembled, and the literal reading is a picture from the story below rather than a definition — which is why translating the four characters one at a time rarely gets you there.
The boy Li Bai, bored with his studies, ran away from school and met an old woman grinding an iron pestle on a stone. She told him she was making a needle. He went back to his books and became the greatest poet of the Tang.
Source: Tang-dynasty legend of Li Bai, recorded in 《方舆胜览》13th century
The reading shown is the one each character takes inside this idiom — chengyu keep older readings, so it is not always the everyday one. The meanings are read from the same dictionary that powers the translators.
Want the stroke order for one of these? Each character links to its dictionary entry, which animates it.
铁杵成针 is pronounced tiě chǔ chéng zhēn and means enough patient effort will get you there. Literally it says "grind an iron rod into a needle" — like most chengyu, the literal reading is a picture from a story rather than a definition.
Tang-dynasty legend of Li Bai, recorded in 《方舆胜览》13th century. The boy Li Bai, bored with his studies, ran away from school and met an old woman grinding an iron pestle on a stone. She told him she was making a needle. He went back to his books and became the greatest poet of the Tang.
tiě chǔ chéng zhēn. Press the audio button on this page to hear it spoken by a native voice. Tones here are citation tones, so 一 is written yī even where it is said yí in running speech.
铁 (tiě) Iron, 杵 (chǔ) Pestle, 成 (chéng) Become (accomplish - completed), 针 (zhēn) Needle (pin - injection - stitch). These meanings come from the same dictionary as the translators on this site, and the reading shown is the one the character takes inside this idiom.
Yes. Chengyu are not archaic — they are ordinary educated speech, and they turn up in conversation, newspapers and exams. This one sits in the beginner band, which reflects how common it is and how hard its characters are.
Rebuild 铁杵成针 from scrambled tiles in the Chengyu Story Puzzle, test yourself on idiom meanings in the Chengyu Quiz, browse all the idioms, or save this one above and review it on your review deck.
Every idiom here comes with the story it was compressed from — that is the rule for being listed, and it is why they stick.
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