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Definition 2024

metonymy for the everyday routine of a Parisian or more generally urban worker. Roughly, same old same old or also rat race.

The expression and the poem from which it is drawn are generally taken as critiques of the monotony of workaday life.

Literally "metro, work, sleep". Abbreviated from the last line of a 1951 poem by Pierre Béarn, collected in Couleurs d’usine (Factory colors):

Au déboulé garçon pointe ton numéro

Pour gagner ainsi le salaire

D’un morne jour utilitaire

Métro, boulot, bistro, mégots, dodo, zéro

Literal translation:

Rush in boy punch your number

Thus to earn the salary

Of a dreary utilitarian day

Metro, work, bistro, cigs, sleep, zero