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Glite Dictionary
Sisyphean labour

Sisyphean labour

9.9
A long task that can never be finished, even if you keep trying
  • noun
  • /ˌsɪsɪˈfiːən ˈleɪbər/
  • Literature
translation icon : trabajo sísifo
  • After hours of trying to fix an unsolvable software bug, he described it as a Sisyphean labour.

Examples

  • The volunteers soon found cleaning the entire coastline to be a Sisyphean labour.

  • Completing this report feels like a Sisyphean labour.

  • Maintaining perfect order in the busy household became her Sisyphean labour.

  • Many believe that organizing the office is a Sisyphean labour.

  • After hours of trying to fix an unsolvable software bug, he described it as a Sisyphean labour.

  • Maintaining perfect order in the busy household became her Sisyphean labour.

  • The volunteers soon found cleaning the entire coastline to be a Sisyphean labour.

Antonyms

success
∞ 1.0

Getting what you want after working hard

productive
293 3.5

Able to do a lot and get useful results

How Futile

Sisyphean labour
  • Literature
9.9

Surface Forms

Sisyphean labour singular
Sisyphean labours plural
Sisyphean labors plural
Sisyphean labor singular

Morphology

Sisyphean + labor

The meaning rests on the mythological reference to Sisyphus rather than on compositional semantics: 'Sisyphean' encodes the idea of endless, futile toil through cultural knowledge, not through transparent combination with 'labour'. A B1 learner who only knows the constituent words (and not the myth or literary usage) would not reliably infer the idiomatic sense, so the expression is not predictable from its parts.

Etymology

The phrase Sisyphean labour comes from an old Greek story about a man called Sisyphus who had to roll a huge stone up a hill, but the stone always fell back down. So Sisyphean labour means 'an endless, useless task' that you must start again and again and can never finish.