求之不得 — Chinese idiom

Meaning

• lit. seek but fail to get ; fig. exactly what one’s been looking for

Character by character

• 求qiúto seek; to request, to demand; to beseech, to beg
• 之zhīmarks preceding phrase as modifier of following ph
• 不bùno, not, un-; negative prefix
• 得déto obtain, to get, to acquire; suitable, proper; r

Idioms sharing a character

• 不忮不求 bù zhì bù qiú
• 不求甚解 bù qiú shèn jiě
• 刻舟求剑 kè zhōu qiú jiàn
• 吹毛求疵 chuī máo qiú cī
• 梦寐以求 mèng mèi yǐ qiú
• 孜孜以求 zī zī yǐ qiú
• 寤寐求之 wù mèi qiú zhī
• 实事求是 shí shì qiú shì
• 急于求成 jí yú qiú chéng
• 舍身求法 shě shēn qiú fǎ

Data: CC-CEDICT (CC BY-SA 4.0); Unihan Database (Unicode License v3). Retrieved 2026-10-22.