呕心沥血

Pronunciation: ǒu xīn lì xuè Literal meaning: Vomit heart drip blood

Origin & Usage

Li He wrote by riding out with a bag, dropping lines into it as they came, and working them up at night; his mother, looking at the bag, said this boy would not stop until he had vomited out (呕) his heart (心). Han Yu, in a related image, wrote of cutting out his liver for paper and dripping (沥) his blood (血) for ink. The phrase joins the two. What it describes is work that costs the person doing it, and it belongs to creative and intellectual labour rather than to effort in general.

Examples

English: "The author poured her deepest emotions into the novel"

Chinese: 作者把最深的情感倾注在这部小说中