On the Seaboard — August Strindberg

What starts out as an account of a humdrum administrative assignment is elevated to an existential examination of the meaning of life in Swedish author August Strindberg's novel On the Seaboard. A bureaucrat is sent to a remote island outpost with the task of educating the local fishermen about advances in fishing techniques, but he is unprepared for the pushback he receives from the staunchly traditional community.