"The Sorcerer's Apprentice" (German: "Der Zauberlehrling") is a poem by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe written in 1797.

Tired of fetching water by pail, the apprentice enchants a broom to do the work for him, using magic in which he is not fully trained.

The narrator, Tychiades, is visiting the house of a sick and elderly friend, Eucrates, where he has an argument about the reality of the supernatural.

17th-century French author Eustace le Noble wrote a literary variant of this type of tale with L'apprenti magicien.

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels alluded to Goethe's poem in The Communist Manifesto (1848), comparing modern bourgeois society to "the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells.

"[6] "The Sorcerer's Apprentice" is a 1962 episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents featuring Brandon deWilde as mentally-troubled youth Hugo, coveting the magic wand of a kindly magician.

The 2010 film The Sorcerer's Apprentice features a scene based on the Fantasia conception of Goethe's poem.

The Fantasia variant also appears in the video game series, Kingdom Hearts, with the sorcerer Yen Sid serving as an adviser to the heroes, teaching Mickey, Sora, and Riku the Keyblade skills needed to guard the universe from his former friend Xehanort's plan.