# Quote — B. Traven, The Death Ship

> There is no reason why I should run after a job. I'd have to stand up before the manager like a beggar, cap in hand, as sheepishly as if I were asking him to let me shine his shoes with my spit. In fact, usually it is less humiliating to beg for a meal than to ask for work. Can the skipper sail his bucket without sailors? Or can the engineer, no matter how clever he is, build a locomotive without workers? Nevertheless, the worker has to stand with his cap in hand and beg for a job. He has to stand there like a dog about to be beaten.

- Author: [B. Traven](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven.md)
- Book: [The Death Ship](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven/the-death-ship.md)
- Page: 69
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/B._Traven#The_Death_Ship_(1926)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven/the-death-ship/there-is-no-reason

## More from this book

> Ordinary people can never fall over the walls, because they never dare climb high enough to see what is beyond the walls.

p. 190 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven/the-death-ship/ordinary-people-can.md)

> Bravery on the battlefield? Don't make me laugh. Bravery on the field of work. Here, of course, you don't get any medals; no mention in the report, either. You are no hero here. Just a bum. Or a communist always making trouble and never satisfied with the conditions as ordered by the Lord himself to help the profits.

p. 174 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven/the-death-ship/bravery-on-the.md)

> [After the war] The governments thought it wiser, finally, to make up again. Time had come when all governments were convinced it would be cheaper and more profitable to talk peace and wait for a better chance. The burglars and gangsters sat down to an elegant peace-banquet. The workers, and the little plain people of all countries, had to pay the damages that is, the hospital bills, the funeral expenses, the tombs for unknown soldiers, and the bills for all the banquets and conferences which left everybody in the world, save the hotel-owners, exactly where they had been before. And all those little people, who had, not profits, but all the losses and all the deaths, were now allowed to wave flags and handkerchiefs at the victorious armies coming back covered with glory and everlasting fame.

p. 153 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven/the-death-ship/after-the-war.md)