One for Sorrow, Two For Joy: Difference between revisions

{{quote|''One for sorrow, two for joy,''<br />

''Three for a girl, four for a boy,''<br />

''Five for silver, six for gold,''<br />

''Seven for a secret that must never be told.''|'''[[Mother Goose]]'''}}

{{quote|''Other birds collect twigs for their nests. Magpies collect jewels for theirs.''|Flavor Text for the ''[[Magic: theThe Gathering]]'' card [http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid{{=}}129764 Thieving Magpie]}}

One popular [[AllAny IsTorment WellYou ThatCan EndsWalk WellAway From]] [[Happy Ending]] is for accusations of theft to be cleared up by the revelation that a magpie stole the item in question.

{{examples|Examples}}

{{quote| '''Delirium''', in ''The Wake'': One for sorrow, two for sorrow, three for sorrow, four for for for I don't know. But I'm bored of sorrow, five for three two one, six for gold, seven for a magpie who tells me where to go...''}}

* In ''[[Tintin (Comic Book)/Recap/The Castafiore Emerald|The Castafiore Emerald]]'', [[Tintin]] has a [[Eureka Moment]] when he hears that Castafiore, still missing her emerald, will be performing in ''La Gazza Ladra'' (the Rossini opera mentioned below). Sure enough, he finds the emerald in a magpie's nest.

{{quote| '''Eric Draven''': Seven blackbirds in a tree, count them and see what they be. One for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl and four for a boy. Five for silver, six for gold, seven for a secret that's never been told. You're all going to die.}}

== Commercials[[Fan Works]] ==

{{quote| '''[[Death Dealer|Luxord:]]''' [using [[The Gambler|two dice]], but mentions magpies] "Two is for fresh luck, while three starts the play. Four means start running, five means you stay. Six earns you silver, seven earns gold. Eight for new allies, nine for the old. Ten wins good fortune, eleven risks all -- but twelve wins the match and there, stops the ball." (and when asked about one) "One is for sorrow, because it's always alone."}}

* In the ''[[Troll Cops (Fanfic)|Troll Cops]]'' [[Homestuck]] AU, there is a pair of stories called "One For Sorrow", which has:

{{quote| ''One is for Sorrow.<br />

''Two is for Mirth.<br />

''Three is for a Funeral.<br />

''Four is for a Birth.<br />

''Five is for Heaven.<br />

''Six is for Hell.<br />

''Seven's for the Devil himself.'' }}

* Magpies show up at several key points in [[Snow White and Thethe Huntsman]]

* Several versions of the rhyme occur in [[Terry Pratchett]]'s ''[[Discworld (Literature)/Carpe Jugulum|Carpe Jugulum]]''. It's explained that none of them work very well, because nobody knows the version the magpies use. Also, the "modern" vampires of that book shape-shift into magpies rather than bats, which is a pun on their family name (de Magpyr).

** One of the peripheral Discworld books (I think it might have been an art collection){{verify}} also has Pterry bemoan the fact that Britain used to have hundreds of regional variations on this rhyme, but nowadays if you ask anyone they'll all give you the version from ''Magpie''.

*** He bemoans this state of affairs in "The Folklore of Discworld," but happily he got to know the book's co-writer, Jacqueline Simpson, because she answered "which one?" to the question "do you know the magpie song.?"

* In [[Michael Flynn]]'s ''[[Spiral Arm (Literature)|In the Lion's Mouth]]'', Shadows' subordinates, in black and white, are called magpies. When one is always in Donovan's line-of-sight, he feels uneasy, knowing the old Terran belief that a single magpie is bad luck.

* In [[JRRJ. R. R. Tolkien]]'s ''Unfinished Tales'', one of the tales after ''[[The Lord of the Rings]]'' includes going through Saruman's tower and discovering he had become not a dragon but a magpie with what he hoarded. They still find a treasure there.

== [[Live -Action TV]] ==

* In the ''[[Doctor Who (TV)|Doctor Who]]'' episode "Boom Town", the Slitheen Margaret Blaine described the Doctor as having a "magpie mind", i.e. one that's always collecting bits of information.

== [[Music and Sound Effects]] ==

{{quote| In mercy's shadow, nothing grows./And she's running hard now, counting crows.}}

{{quote| Count my brothers and count my sisters, we'll tell your fortune and we'll tell you true/But the path's all covered in claws and feathers, Magpie, there's too many of you...}}

* "Two Magpies" off of [[Paul McCartney|Paul McCartney's]]'s album ''Electric Arguments'' features lines from the rhyme. Unsurprisingly, it's [[Ear Worm|extremely catchy]].

* The famous rhyme, with many variations. (Sometimes quoted for [[Ravens and Crows]] --— but chiefly magpies.)

** '-eight's a wish, and nine a kiss; ten is a bird you must not miss.'

* ''[[Magic: theThe Gathering]]'' has a "Thieving Magpie" card; whenever it deals damage to an opponent, you get to draw a card (representing something that the magpie picked up).

* The "Freedom City" setting for ''[[Mutants and Masterminds]]'' has a [[Gentleman Thief]] named Magpie who can [[Transporters and Teleporters|teleport]], but ''never'' would he teleport ''into'' a building-- hebuilding—he [[Self -Imposed Challenge|savors the challenge of breaking in the hard way]]. His power is used ''only'' for last-second escapes, and even then only if he can't vanish any other way.

* In ''[[No Rest for The Wicked (Webcomicwebcomic)|No Rest for The Wicked]]'', [http://www.forthewicked.net/archive/05-05.html November was teased for using the verse for ravens, instead of magpies.]

* In ''[[Tales of the Questor]]'', [https://web.archive.org/web/20130227023240/http://www.rhjunior.com/totq/00543.html they observe that going through the princeling's treasure found a lot of cheap bits, because he was like a magpie.]