The Magpie at Diaoling
Zhuangzi stalks a strange magpie with a slingshot — and watches the chain: the cicada forgot its body in the shade, the mantis forgot its form at the catch, the magpie forgot its true nature at the gain. Then the gamekeeper chases him. The only story in the book where Zhuangzi himself is the one who fails: things pile onto each other, and the two kinds summon each other.
The passage
庄周游乎雕陵之野一作”樊”，睹一异鹊，自南方来者，翼广七尺，目大运寸，感周之颡，而集于栗林。庄周曰：“此何鸟哉？翼殷不逝，目大不睹！“蹇裳躩步，执弹而留之；睹一蝉，方得美荫而忘其身；螳螂执翳而搏之，见得而忘其形；异鹊从而利之，见利一作”得”而忘其真。庄周怵然，曰：“噫！物固相累，二类相召也！“捐弹而反走，虞人逐而谇之。庄周反入，三月不庭。蔺且从而问之：“夫子何为顷间甚不庭乎？“庄周曰：“吾守形而忘身，观于浊水而迷于清渊。且吾闻诸夫子曰：‘入其俗，从其俗。‘今吾游于雕陵而忘吾身，异鹊感吾颡，游于栗林而忘真，栗林虞人以吾为戮，吾所以不庭也。”
Zhuang Zhou was wandering the wilds of Diaoling when he saw a strange magpie, coming from the south, its wings seven feet across, its eyes an inch in diameter, that brushed against Zhou’s forehead and settled in a chestnut grove. Zhuang Zhou said: “What bird is this? Its wings are huge yet it flies nowhere; its eyes are huge yet it sees nothing!” He hitched up his robe, stepped forward quickly, and stood with his slingshot ready — then saw a cicada that had just found a lovely patch of shade and forgotten its body; a mantis, shading itself with a leaf as it pounced, that had seen the catch and forgotten its form; the strange magpie following after to profit from it, that had seen the gain and forgotten its true nature. Zhuang Zhou, startled, said: “Ah! Things pile onto each other, and the two kinds summon each other!” He threw away the slingshot and turned to leave, but the gamekeeper chased him down and scolded him. Zhuang Zhou went back and for three months did not go out. Lin Qie asked him: “Master, why have you been staying in like this?” Zhuang Zhou said: “I kept to the form and forgot the body, was gazing at murky water and lost myself in the clear pool. And I have heard the Master say: ‘Enter their customs, follow their customs.’ Now I was wandering at Diaoling and forgot my body; the strange magpie brushed my forehead; I wandered into the chestnut grove and forgot what is true; and the chestnut grove’s gamekeeper took me for game. That is why I stay in.”
Why this passage matters
- The only story where Zhuangzi himself fails. Every other protagonist in the book is a demonstration — the cook, the cicada-catcher, the bell-stand maker all succeed; even the Confucius of this chapter learns and leaves. Here the book’s own author is the one caught, slingshot in hand, chased and scolded by a gamekeeper (虞人逐而谇之), and the punishment is self-imposed: 三月不庭 — three months without going out. The site’s advantage-and-pelt file holds the chapter’s general law (having people is a burden; being had is a worry); this passage is the law applied to the book itself. The mirror, for once, is turned on the mirror-holder.
- The chain of forgetting, one verb each. The passage is built as a ladder of 忘 (forgetting): the cicada 忘其身 (forgot its body — in the shade), the mantis 忘其形 (forgot its form — at the catch), the magpie 忘其真 (forgot its true nature — at the gain) — and then, in Zhuang Zhou’s own self-diagnosis, the fourth rung: 吾守形而忘身 — he kept the form and forgot the body. The site’s mantis file (the Zhuangzi’s own one-line version of the same chain from ch. 4) holds the compression; this passage is the expansion, and the idiom survives it: 螳螂捕蝉，黄雀在后 — the mantis stalks the cicada, the oriole is behind the mantis. Each link’s advantage is the next link’s invitation.
- The two-sentence diagnosis. 物固相累，二类相召也 — things inherently pile onto each other; the two kinds summon each other. 相累 is the pile (each gain weighs on the next creature); 相召 is the summons (each advantage calls its taker). And Zhuang Zhou’s own version, five steps of self-accusation: kept the form, forgot the body; gazed at murky water, lost the clear pool; wandered and forgot himself; was touched by the magpie; was taken for game. 观于浊水而迷于清渊 — gazing at the murky water while losing the clear pool — is the book’s own image for the moment of profit-hunting: the hunter, at the instant of aiming, is the least-seeing creature in the grove. The site’s murky-water family holds the companion image (the carpenter’s apprentice’s blindness to the near); this is its self-application.
- The magpie’s first touch. The story opens with the bird brushing Zhuang Zhou’s forehead (感周之颡) — the wing-touch that starts everything, registered in the site’s touch line: the book’s animals touch its humans to wake them. And the bird itself is the riddle: 翼殷不逝，目大不睹 — wings huge yet flying nowhere, eyes an inch wide yet seeing nothing. The huge eyes that don’t see are the chapter’s animal-pun on 昭昭 (the blazing display of the dithering-bird lesson): what is largest in the field of vision is often the least seen.
- The rule quoted from the Master. 入其俗，从其俗 — enter their customs, follow their customs — is what Zhuang Zhou remembers after the gamekeeper has chased him out of the grove: he entered the grove’s custom (the hunt) and did not follow its rule (the hunter is game too). The site’s no-formula frame (the same chapter’s opening: the tree and the goose die by opposite rules) holds the grammar: this is not a lesson against aiming — it is the observation that every aiming happens inside a grove that has its own gamekeeper. The escape is not refusal of the custom but the two-walk inside it: enter, and know what entering makes you.
Sources
- Zhuangzi ch. 20 (Shan Mu, outer chapter), the Diaoling passage, verified against the Wikisource full chapter (retrieved 2026-10-07): 庄周游乎雕陵之野一作樊，睹一异鹊，自南方来者，翼广七尺，目大运寸，感周之颡，而集于栗林。庄周曰：此何鸟哉？翼殷不逝，目大不睹！蹇裳躩步，执弹而留之；睹一蝉，方得美荫而忘其身；螳螂执翳而搏之，见得而忘其形；异鹊从而利之，见利一作得而忘其真。庄周怵然，曰：噫！物固相累，二类相召也！捐弹而反走，虞人逐而谇之。庄周反入，三月不庭。蔺且从而问之：夫子何为顷间甚不庭乎？庄周曰：吾守形而忘身，观于浊水而迷于清渊。且吾闻诸夫子曰：入其俗，从其俗。今吾游于雕陵而忘吾身，异鹊感吾颡，游于栗林而忘真，栗林虞人以吾为戮，吾所以不庭也 — with the reading variants registered (雕陵之野/雕陵之樊; 见利/见得) and the passage's fixed status as the source of the idiom 螳螂捕蝉，黄雀在后