Sisyphus,
Greek Sisyphos.
Mythological king of
Corinth
who was said to be both
cunning and
violent. He is mentioned both in the
Illiad
and the
Odyssey. He was the son of
Aeolus (
Eolus), the
God of winds, and
Sisyphus himself has sometimes been attributed as the father of
Odysseus.
The most famous story about Sisyphus is the one about his death and
eternal punishment. When Death came to bring him to Hades, Sisyphus put
Death into chains, which resulted in that no one could die. Luckily for Death - but not for the rest of us -,
he was released by Pluto, who sent the God of War Ares to unchain him.
This done, Death forced Sisyphus to come to Hades. But the clever king had
pulled one more trick on Death; he had prepared his departure so that Death had
to let him return to the living to avenge his wife before returning to Hades
for ever. This was because she - on his orders - had neglected to bury him
properly. But again back in life, he did not avenge his wife nor return back to
the underworld. Instead he continued to live on his life until he died many
years later a second time.
For having fooled Death not once, but twice, the almighty Zeus decided to
give Sisyphus the ultimate punishment: endless, futile labor. He had to
roll a stone up to the top of a mountain, where it would roll all the way
down again when it reached the summit.
From this, we have the expression "labor of Sisyphus" for
seemingly endless and meaningless tasks.
Albert Camus wrote an essay in 1942 on the fate of Sisyphus, called
The Myth of Sisyphus. Camus's idea was that Sisyphus instead of regarding his
whole existence as absurd, the found meaning and happiness in the work
itself, as he writes:
"The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to
fill a man's heart"