To not know whether to cry or laugh; to be in an awkward, embarrassing, or ludicrous situation; to find something both annoying and amusing, leading to a state of mixed emotions or confusion.
Era:
Ancient
Frequency:
Antonym:
Story:
During the final days of the Southern Chen Dynasty, Xu Deyan and his wife, Princess Lechang, anticipated impending separation. They broke a bronze mirror into two halves, each keeping one piece, and promised to reunite on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, by finding someone selling the other half of the mirror in the market.
After the fall of Chen, Princess Lechang was taken into the household of Yang Su.
On the agreed-upon day, Xu Deyan managed to reach Chang'an. He found a servant selling a broken mirror piece and, through it, successfully reunited with Princess Lechang in front of Yang Su.
At this reunion, Princess Lechang composed a poem that included the line, '笑啼俱不敢，方验做人难' (I dare neither to laugh nor to cry, only then do I truly realize the difficulty of being human). This line perfectly captures the profound mixed emotions and helplessness that underpin the idiom '啼笑皆非'.