Anekdote zur Senkung der Arbeitsmoral ("Anecdote on Lowering the work ethic") is a

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest ...

by Heinrich Böll about an encounter between an enterprising

tourist Tourism is travel for pleasure or business; also the theory and practice of touring, the business of attracting, accommodating, and entertaining tourists, and the business of operating tours. The World Tourism Organization defines tourism mo ...

and a small

fisherman A fisher or fisherman is someone who captures fish and other animals from a body of water, or gathers shellfish. Worldwide, there are about 38 million commercial and subsistence fishers and fish farmers. Fishers may be professional or recreati ...

, in which the tourist suggests how the fisherman can improve his life. It was written for a May Day programme on the

Norddeutscher Rundfunk Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR; ''Northern German Broadcasting'') is a public broadcasting, public radio and television broadcaster, based in Hamburg. In addition to the city-state of Hamburg, NDR broadcasts for the German states of Lower Saxony, M ...

in 1963, and is considered one of the best stories written by Heinrich Böll.

Plot

The story is set in an unnamed harbor on the west coast of

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

. A smartly-dressed enterprising tourist is taking photographs when he notices a shabbily dressed local fisherman taking a nap in his fishing boat. The tourist is disappointed with the fisherman's apparently lazy attitude towards his work, so he approaches the fisherman and asks him why he is lying around instead of catching fish. The fisherman explains that he went fishing in the morning, and the small catch would be sufficient for the next two days. The tourist tells him that if he goes out to catch fish multiple times a day, he would be able to buy a motor in less than a year, a second boat in less than two years, and so on. The tourist further explains that one day, the fisherman could even build a small cold storage plant, later a pickling factory, fly around in a

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

, build a fish restaurant, and export

lobster Lobsters are a family (biology), family (Nephropidae, Synonym (taxonomy), synonym Homaridae) of marine crustaceans. They have long bodies with muscular tails and live in crevices or burrows on the sea floor. Three of their five pairs of legs ...

directly to

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

without a middleman. The nonchalant fisherman asks, "Then what?" The tourist enthusiastically continues, "Then, without a care in the world, you could sit here in the harbor, doze in the sun, and look at the glorious sea." "But I'm already doing that", says the fisherman. The enlightened tourist walks away pensively, with no trace of

pity Pity is a sympathetic sorrow evoked by the suffering of others, and is used in a comparable sense to '' compassion'', ''condolence'' or ''empathy'' – the word deriving from the Latin ''pietas'' (etymon also of '' piety''). Self-pity is pi ...

for the fisherman, only a little envy.

Popularity

The story, with its several adaptions, has been circulated widely on the Internet, and has been quoted in many books and scholarly papers. In one of the most popular versions, the tourist is an American (an MBA from

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

in some versions), and the fisherman is Mexican. The story is also part of the syllabi of several universities. It is often quoted in texts that discuss the relationship between

money Money is any item or verifiable record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts, such as taxes, in a particular country or socio-economic context. The primary functions which distinguish money are as ...

and

happiness Happiness, in the context of Mental health, mental or emotional states, is positive or Pleasure, pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy. Other forms include life satisfaction, well-being, subjective well-being, flourishin ...

, and has been included in textbooks teaching the German language.Turneaure, Brigitte M. ''Der treffende Ausdruck, Texte, Themen, Übungen'', 2nd ed., pp. 26–28. W. W. Norton, New York, 1996. .

Plot

Popularity

See also

References

Further reading