sisyphus (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Sisyphus was the king of Ephyra who cheated death twice and was thus punished to forever roll a boulder up a hill in the afterlife. Each time he reached the top of the hill, the boulder would roll back down, forcing him to repeat his task for eternity.

Sisyphus gained memetic status in 2023 due to the concluding quote from the 1942 book "The Myth of Sisyphus" stating that "one must imagine Sisyphus happy", praising Sisyphus for never giving up his impossible task went viral on TikTok. This later evolved into a shitposting memes involving pointing out various "reference" to his boulder-rolling punishment.