Work versus Labor:

Lewis Hyde:

"Work is an intended activity that is accomplished through the will. A labor can be intended but only to the extent of doing the groundwork, or of not doing things that would clearly prevent the labor. Beyond that, labor has its own schedule. Things get done, but we often have the odd sense that we didn't do them. Paul Goodman wrote in a journal once, 'I have recently written a few good poems. But I have no feeling that I wrote them.' That is the declaration of a laborer. ... And labor, because it sets its own pace, is usually accomplished by idleness, leisure, even sleep."