The Little Prince

"The little prince" is a contemporary fairytale whose plot is surreal and made up, but has real characters. The author wanted to show us the problems of modern ages. He talks about the lack of love and finding of it as well as the loneliness of people.

We can see the story as an allegory that leads us to the moral of the story. The author's message can be interpreted in many different ways, depending on the reader.  The story is primarily written for grownups as a leader to the children's opinion of the world.

It talks about human power thirst and greed. Nothing matters to the people living on the planets but power and making themselves look busy and important. They lost all sense and meaning of love.

The little prince learned a lot of thing from his friend the fox. It is important to put afford into someone and to do it out of love and if we cry out of love those tears will do us good. We should only see love because that is the only way we'll ever be happy.

The little prince, through his love for the rose, found out what love is and how important it is. The afford we put into someone and the responsibility we feel is love. When The little Prince realized that he could die in peace because he knew he will be back with his rose again.

All of that is very important in today's world of fake bliss where only pleasure is of matter.

Genre: fairytale

Time: unspecified

Place: Sahara desert, a few asteroids in Space

This fairytale has the typical characteristics of a fairytale - no specific place and time even though we have mentioned Sahara. The problem is that at the end even the author drew a place with two lines. The desert may just be a symbol of the desert that is our life.

Also, we do not have a specific time and the only important thing is the growing up of a man. The author plays around with the time saying that something happened 6 years ago which means nothing to us because we do not know when is the plot taking place.

Book Summary

The writer starts the story with an experience he had in his childhood when he drew a snake emperor and he was very proud of that drawing. The problem was that all of the grownups only saw a hat on the drawing and not the emperor. He was disappointed by their reaction so he drew another drawing with and elephant in it and after that one many advised him to quit drawing.

He then decided to become a pilot and travel everywhere. He met a lot of people and whenever he showed somebody the drawing they would still see a hat.

Everything started changing when his plane crashed in the middle of nowhere and he had to fix it for himself. After the first night, he actually slept a boy with golden hair woke him up. He did not seem lost or frightened and only wanted the pilot to draw him a sheep in the sand.

The pilot was confused because he did not know how to draw that so he drew the only thing he knew how to draw. He was very surprised when the boy told him he does not want an elephant inside a snake emperor because the elephant was big and the emperor was dangerous. The boy told him that in his world everything is small and then the pilot accepted to draw him a sheep.

The boy rejected every drawing because to him is did not look like a sheep and the pilot was losing his patient because he was in a hurry to fix his plane. Then he drew a box and told the boy that the sheep was in it. The boy loved it and then the pilot met the little prince.

He found out that he was from another planet, asteroid B 612, that was just a bit bigger than him. In his conversation with the prince, he found out interesting stories about his planet, journey and arrival to Earth. The third day he found out something about baobabs that contaminated his planet. Because of the danger, his planet was the prince wanted a sheep that will eat the baobabs.

The fourth day the pilot found out that he loves sunsets and that he used to observe them at his planer and on the fifth day he admitted that there was a flower he was hoping for the sheep not to eat so the pilot promised he'll draw the sheep a muzzle.

Even though there were many flowers on his planet the prince love the rose more than any other flower. It was the reason why he ran away because he did not know what to do about it. Now that he was far away from his rose he realized what it meant to him.

When he was leaving his planet he used the birds and cleaned up after himself because he was convinced that he'll never have to go back there. The little prince met a king on an asteroid. He lived there alone and nothing existed but him. On a next asteroid he met a woman that was a stuck up who declared him her fan. He did not like her so he kept on travelling.

On the fifth planet the day lasted for a minute but there was no place for him so he left that planet too. The sixth planet was bigger and there he met a geographer who he asked for a favor. He wanted to get the coordinates of his rose but the geographer said no because he thought that the rose is something that will go away with time. That made the little prince sad so he went away from that planet and came to earth.

The first place he went to was the desert in Africa and the first creature he met was a snake. She confessed that she was powerful and that she could take him anywhere he wants with a single touch. He traveled the whole desert but did not see any people there and that is the reasona why hehad a bad impression about Earth.

He also walked along a garden filled with roses and that made him sad because it brought up memories and then he met a fox with which he played but she explained to him that in order to play with her he should tame her. While he was hanging with her he realized what friendship was and once again he realized why his rose was so important to him. He went to the rose garden again and said goodbye to them telling them that his rose is special because she was his best friend.

When they were saying their goodbyes the fox told him that a man can only see good with his heart and that a man is forever responsible for what he has tamed.  The eight day in the desert the pilot ran out of water so they went looking for a well. The pilot carried the prince in his hands and he knew why the prince was special. He was special because of his loyalty to one flower.

In the end they found a well and drank some water together. The pilot saw that the prince wants to go back to his planet and he went on fixing the engine of his plane. When the pilot checked up on the prince he saw that he was talking to the snake that was actually poisonous. She told him that he should go back to the place where he fell on Earth.

The prince knew that the pilot fixed the plane and he was happy for going back home. The problem is that the snake flashed and prince fell down like sand. As a memory, many stars remained in the sky to remind us of his smile whenever we look up.

Charachters: The little prince

Charachter analysis

The little prince - the main character of the story. He is a boy that travelled to Earth from outer Space with hope that he will find out something new. He went on his journey to get to know himself and others better. Author did not describe him but he did place a drawing of him in the book. By the drawing we can say it was a golden hair boy, dressed in a prince outfit and a sword in his hand. He met many different people and wondered what the meaning of their existence is. His standards were different than the standards in the world. He was simple and his standards were pureness, simplicity and love. He thinks we are overly burdened with unimportant things. He was loyal to his flower all the time and he teaches us the true value of love. Love is a mystery to many people while this fragile and little boy found it. He is like a child simple, honest, curious and he never gave up on what he wants to know. He is well behaved. He accepted the death that will bring him back to his rose and did not forget about his friend who will be able to see him every time he looks up into the sky.

Antoine de Saint-Exupery Biography

Antoine de Saint-Exupery was born in Lyon, 29th June 1900. He was a French writer and a pilot known as Saint-ex. He got famous because of "The little prince" published in 1943.

Antoine finished a pilot course and went to a pilot school and during the 1920's he worked as a pilot in north Africa while in the 30's he went to South America.

During the II. World War he worked as a war pilot and he died in 1944 when the German forces crashed his plane over the Mediterranean Sea.

He published some novel and short stories: "L'Aviateur", "Lettre a un otage", "Vol de nuit"…

"The little prince", his most famous work, shows in an allegorically the human need for friendship and love. He talked about some important themes of our time such as loneliness, superficiality and power thirst.