The Little Prince - Essay Example

? THE LITTLE PRINCE By and of The Little Prince The little prince is a children’sbook written by a French author, Antoine de Saint-Exupery. It is the finest and the most read of all his books. It is the most talked about book in France, and was voted the best book in the 20th century. It was so famous that it has been translated into more than two hundred and fifty different languages all over the world. The book is among the world’s most bestselling books of all time, with a record sale of more than 140 million copies. The book has been adopted and translated into many forms of media productions, these include; screen, audio, stage, and many others (Lerner, L. J. 2004, 3). A journalistic view of the book reveals so much about the contemporary life and the human behavior towards other people, those who they consider close acquaintances, and those perceived to be enemies (Johnson, K. A. 2012, 76). The little prince, George is a character from a different planet, in search of adventure, and because of boredom, he leaves his planet to explore the outside world. This shows how human beings are mobile and tend to travel a lot in search of the values they consider deer to them, in Antoine’s real life scenario, he left his country. France, and went to the United States to convince the country to join the in the anti-Nazi war (Shirer, W. L. 2011, 197). This is his driving force, he moved from his own home to a foreign place to satisfy his urge of wanting to help his country from a different perspective. The same applies to the little Prince George, he left his own planet due to a driving force, the urge to find out more and move out of his free cocoon. This, he eventually achieves, he grabs the first opportunity that comes around, the bird migration, he uses the birds to move to other planets. Here we learn about the nature of humans to take advantage of things that come around to satisfy their own needs. People trend to have a strong pull towards achieving their goals such that they do anything possible to achieve it; they are opportunistic in nature, using something that they did not expect to come around to their advantage. Antoine creates a mental picture of a man clinging to the wings of numerous birds flying from one planet to another (Normington, K. 2007, 347). Thinking of it, it looks like a big risk to take, but the little prince takes it anyway. He has an opportunity that he knows might not come around again. The manner in which Antoine brings out all these is quite remarkable. The scene has been translated into a graphical form by the media, a picture of a young boy waiting to cling to some flying birds; he stands on a small planet, which he considers to be home. What catches the eye is the fact that, the prince seems to be sad. This is probably because he is leaving his little rose behind. This, as we can see, is the only thing that he is emotionally attached to, he is sad to leave it behind, though they have had their differences. We are told how the little Prince George was so emotionally attached to the rose flower, all the things he did to prevent it from harm. How he uprooted all the weeds that prevented it from growing to maturity (Saint-Exupery, A.D. 2004, 35). At some point, they even quarreled and this is what prompted him to leave in the first place, he thought that the rose was taking advantage of him. However, they get through it and become friends again. This alludes to the human nature of having emotional attachments to other people or things; these can be even pets or other gadgets, these are the things that people hold closest to the heart and are so deer to them, in most cases, these are persons of the opposite sex. the flower represented spouses, how relationships work, people get emotionally attached, they go through so much together trying to protect themselves, at some point they differ in opinions and fall apart, but sooner or later they mend things and come back together. The aspect of sacrifice also comes in when the rose flower gives Prince George the go ahead to leave, she sacrifices her own happiness for his, and this is evident in the contemporary society, people letting go of their loved ones to pursue their happiness. A good example is when parents let go of their children to get married. It shows that true love involves sacrifice of one’s happiness for another. A picture of this is shown whereby a rose flower is shown hidden inside a glass container; this translates to how the little prince protected the rose flower from being spoiled by the hostile surrounding. The hostile surrounding is depicted by the presence of active volcanoes, the glass is supposed to prevent the rose flower from damage by the volcano. The glass alludes to Prince George since he is the protector of the flower (Johnson, K.A. 2012, 56) Another way in which the writer has indirectly captured a real life situation is when he describes his relationship with the little Prince George. From the beginning, he shows how the little prince is special to him. The little prince is the only one who sees the real thing he had in mind when he drew the, picture of an elephant inside a snake, most of the people did not recognize his drawing, some even misinterpret is for a hat, he is surprised that all long no one had ever appreciated his drawings, only Prince George. At some point the author, say that some things can only be seen through the heart. This means that, it is only those who understand you who see the reasons why you do some of the things. Those with whom you share common and mutual values will always see the best in you even at your lowest moments; they will still comfort you regardless of how wrong you are. When the little prince tell the writer to draw him a sheep and instead he draws a box after trying so hard until he is frustrated. The little prince tells him that his drawing was perfect and exactly he wanted. It shows that true friends are those who encourage you when all the rest turn you down. No one had ever praised the authors drawing before, but the little princess did. This gave him new hope considering the fact that he had even been prevented him from doing any course related to drawing and artwork, that is why he had become a pilot, in the first place. The writer has unique ways of expressing his ideas and relating them to the real life. This is the main reason this book is among the best sellers of all time. When Prince George leaves his planet, he comes across certain funny characters on his way to earth; these are in some of the planets he went through. First, he came across a self-proclaimed king who had no any subjects to rule. This king represents those people who are obsessed with power and go to unimaginable heights to hold positions of power, they might be politicians who engage in poll irregularities, they cheat in the elections to get the positions that they vie for in the government. When they finally get what they want, such rulers are always mean and hated by their subjects. A king with no subjects in this case alludes to leaders who are hated by their own subjects. the little prince George then comes across a character who thinks that he is the most admired person in his planet, the funny part is that his planet is uninhabited by anyone else apart from him, this person stands for those who are hypocrites. They do good things in public so that people perceive them to be good, while behind closed doors, they are so mean, they only want to be known as good by their people yet they are not good in the inside and their intentions are not genuine. Next, Prince George comes across a drunkard, the drunkard is so used to his states that he has forgotten about the shame that comes with it, and he thinks that being drunk is the normal state of the body. The drunkard is an illusion of the characters that were so used to immorality that they think it is the normal way of life; it could be related to those who practiced save trade in the past. Slavery is unacceptable and a violation of fundamental human rights. However, people were so used to it that one could still live a righteous life and owned slaves, the people had become so tolerant to it that it had become a way of life, the same way drinking had become a way of life to the drunkard. There is also the obsessed businessperson who kept counting stars saying that he owned them all. He represents the greedy people in the society, those who grab public resources and use them for the own benefits, they are always driven by the urge to get more, even those that are beyond their reach, the stars have been used to allude on the unreachable things and to bring out the ambitious nature of the businessman. The uncountable nature of the stars shows how much greedy the man is, that he cannot get enough of them. The little Prince George then moves on to the next asteroid where he comes across a lamplighter who is so obsessed with lighting and putting of lights. he does that that on and on for each passing minute, he is an embodiment of the people who spend a lot of time doing things that are non beneficial to them, they keep going in circles doing the same thing over and over again for almost an eternity. These people never learn their lessons. They keep doing the same mistake repeatedly and end up facing the same fate, and they are mostly criminals who have been convicted of different crimes repeatedly, they are always in and out of jail consistently. This the same process of lighting a candle and putting off another every single minute. Lastly, the little prince meets up with a geographer who is so occupied in his theory that he did not have the time to explore the world and confirm his theories. He is engraved in his own work such that it becomes an obsession; he would not do anything else and has his mindset on the project that he is making. He even fails to appreciate other beautiful things that nature has offered, when the little prince talks to him about the rose flower, he shrugs that off and terms it as ephemeral. This hurts the little prince, it also shows how mean the geographer is that he does not care about other things apart from those that he is interested in. he is like those people who destroy good things in an attempt to achieve what they have come to do. When someone clears, a large portion of the forest to erect a building is a real life example of the geographer; they fail to see the beauty of nature, and they are driven by their own greedy motives. The next landing point of Prince George is the planet earth; this is where he comes across the author. He is a pilot who has been forced to believe that he can never be a good artist. His relations have never appreciated anything that he draws. At first, the prince thought that planet earth too was inhabited since he landed in a desert; he is informed by a thorn flower of the inhabitants of earth. The impression that he gets of earth is that of kind people who are always willing to help, the author’s plane crushes at the scene where the little prince landed. Summary The story is narrated from a first person’s point of view. The author narrates about his ordeal with drawing as a young kid, he once drew a picture of an elephant inside a snake, and whoever saw it criticized it so much that the advised him not to take a course that involved drawing or any form of art, some even described it as a hat. That is the reason he became a pilot. According to him, the pictures were fine, only that the elderly people did not look at it in a more critical approach, we later learn that the little prince George understands his drawings because he looks at them with the heart. The narrator comes across Prince George when his plane crashes in the Sahara desert. To his dismay, the prince asks him to draw him a picture of a sheep, the narrator remembers about his old picture of an elephant inside a snake, he shows it to the prince, surprisingly the prince like the picture and translates it correctly as an elephant inside a snake. After hours so many efforts of drawing a proper picture of a sheep, the narrator gives up and draws a box, he explains to the prince that the sheep is inside the box. The prince is so happy that the narrator has drawn the sheep just as he wanted it to be. Later the little prince narrates how he came to the planet earth. He narrates how he came across some funny characters on his way to earth. He narrates about the king who had no subjects, the narrow-minded geographer who spent probably his whole life working on a project that he had not seen himself, and who gave him the idea of coming to planet earth. He also tells the story of the greedy businessperson who kept counting stars and fantasized about owning them all, the drunkard who had been brainwashed by his drinks that drinking was not shameful, and was a normal way of life. A freaky lamp lighter, who lights and puts off his lamps every now and then. The little prince recounts about his own planet where he met a rose flower, and was so emotionally attached to it, he spent most of the time protecting his rose flower from weeds and possible eruptions from the two active volcanoes by uprooting unwanted growth and baobab trees. The rose was the main reason why the prince had wanted the narrator to draw him la sheep, so that it could feed on the weeds that hindered the rose flower from proper growth. His attachment to the rose was so strong, at some point; he regrets having left her all alone and starts to cry, he narrates how they had argued at some point, the little Prince George claiming that the rose was using him. When he was on earth, the prince narrates how he met some friendly company, a snake who offered to take him back home whenever he felt like going; a desert flower informs him about the inhabitants of the desert. The flower describes human beings as having no roots and roaming wherever they wished, it says that they are swayed by the wind and are used to hard lives. What stuns the little prince about the planet earth is the presence of big physical features; he climbs what he perceives to be the biggest mountain he has ever seen expecting to see the whole world when he reached the top of the mountain. instead the prince’s eyes are met a huge plain of vastness with miles of landscape stretching before him, when he shouts he only hears his voice echoing back at him. He translates the echo as voices of mockery from other people. When the great prince comes across a whole bush of roses, he freaks out, and feels downgraded; he gets a feeling that he is not the prince he thought he was anymore. The whole world seems so big that it belittles him. He always thought that his rose flower back at home was the only one of its kind but now he had found a whole bush full of them, he begins to whether his rose even loved him in the first place. the prince lay and cried and was only consoled by a fox that soothed him telling him that the little rose loved him because he tamed it to love him. The prince finds earth so adventurous; he meets a switchman who tells him how people move randomly from place to place-using trains. A merchant suggests to him a pill that quenches thirst, and he would not need to search for water, the prince refuses citing he would gladly look for water. In the desert, with the narrator, at the scene of the plane crash, the narrator thirsts for water and is at the verge of dying, luckily they come across a well. Later the narrator finds the snake to arrange for his trip back home, he seems eager to meet with his rose again. The narrator overhears this and knows about the ill intentions of the snake; he tries to stop the prince from falling into the snakes trap but is unable to. The prince towards the snake, the snake bites him and he dies. The author has mainly applied the use allusion in the book; this book is based on a real life occurrence. At some point in his career, he experienced a plane crash near the Nile delta; he survived the crash but had to live with the hard conditions of the desert climate (Aloian, M. 2013, 243). This is the setting of his book. Most of the characters in the book are from his real contemporary life. The setting of the little prince’s home is that of a volcanic environment, this possibly alludes to El Salvador. This is the land of his wife, and it is known as land of volcanoes since the place has so many volcanoes (Major, J. J. 2001, 28). The baobab trees that threatened the live of the rose flower allude to the Nazi movement, which was a threat to the world. The rose alludes to his wife whom he protects using a glass while in his country, the presence of other roses gives the probability of infidelity in their marriage. The prince most likely alludes to his little self, at the beginning of the book; he dedicates the book to the little Prince George since he is the only one who understands him. When he was a kid he was the only one who understood the meaning of the drawing he had made, hence an indication that his young self might be the prince in the book (Ricks, C. 2002, 186). References Saint-exupe?ry, A. D., & Howard, R. (2000). The little prince. San Diego, Harcourt. Lerner, A. J., et al. (2004). The little prince. Hollywood, Calif, Paramount. Ricks, C. (2002). Allusion to the poets. Oxford [England], Oxford University Press. Buckland, W. (2003). Film studies. London, Teach Yourself. Pater, W. (2010). The Renaissance studies in art and poetry. [S.l.], Floating Press. Govan, E., Nicholson, H., & Normington, K. (2007). Making a performance: devising histories and contemporary practices. London, Routledge. Major, J. J. (2001). Volcano hazards in the San Salvador region, El Salvador. Vancouver, Wash, USGS/Cascades Volcano Observatory. http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Volcanoes/ElSalvador/Publications/OFR01-366/framework. Shirer, W. L. (2011). The rise and fall of the Third Reich: a history of Nazi Germany. New York, Simon & Schuster.html. Aloian, M., & Scavuzzo, W. (2013). The Sahara Desert. New York, Crabtree Pub. Co. Martin, M. T., & Yaquinto, M. (2007). Redress for historical injustices in the United States: on reparations for slavery, Jim Crow, and their legacies. Durham, Duke University Press. Malarte-feldman, C. (2006). The taming of the two: Antione de Saint-Exupe?ry's 'Little Prince'. Beyond Babar : the European Tradition in Children's Literature. Sst. john, B., & Johnson, K. A. (2012). News with a view: essays on the eclipse of objectivity in modern journalism. Jefferson, N.C., McFarland.AINT-EXUPE?RY, A. D. (1977). Le petit prince. Paderborn [u.a.], Scho?ningh. Saint-exupe?ry, A. D., Bower, H., & Howard, R. (2008). The little prince. Melbourne, Bolinda Audio. Saint-exupe?ry, A. D. (2003). I am the little prince = Je suis le petit prince. San Diego, CA, Harcourt, Inc. Perrotta, T., & Wilson, G. (2004). Little children. Prince Frederick, MD, Recorded Books. Read More