Le Petit Prince The Little Prince

[nath]

Certainly this thread is in the wrong place: 'cause it isn't my creation -I don't know to write...
It's just a book that my grandmother offered to me when I was 10 years old...It looks as a tale for kiddies , but indeed it's for the grown up persons..it's a reflexion about the relationships and the way we feel differently things....

This is the only book I cry each time I read it...just because It seems so beautiful to me and touches my heart deeply....Some parts are boring in the beginning when the Little Prince is visiting the differents planets...but some others will always stay in my heart...

I've choose to put it in "The Island of Arts" 'cause it's the book I would bring with me if I should leave for living in an Island alone...may be i'd hide too "The Night-ingale and the Rose" from Oscar Wilde...

The text is here http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littleprince/frames.html

This is the story of an aviator whom the plane crashes in the desert...he suddendly meets a little Boy: Le petit Prince...http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...ges/prince.gif and discovers him and his philosophy of Life...

So if you have time and desire to read it i would be glad you share your feelings about this book with me here..

Chapters have to been read to understand the story
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...echapter8.html
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...echapter9.html

BUT I love particulary this chapter (21) http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...chapter21.html :

It was then that the fox appeared.

"Good morning," said the fox.

"Good morning," the little prince responded politely, although when he turned around he saw nothing.

"I am right here," the voice said, "under the apple tree."

http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littleprince/images/fox.jpg (drawings from the author)
"Who are you?" asked the little prince, and added, "You are very pretty to look at."

"I am a fox," the fox said.

"Come and play with me," proposed the little prince. "I am so unhappy."

"I cannot play with you," the fox said. "I am not tamed."

"Ah! Please excuse me," said the little prince.

But, after some thought, he added:

"What does that mean--'tame'?"

"You do not live here," said the fox. "What is it that you are looking for?"

"I am looking for men," said the little prince. "What does that mean--'tame'?"

"Men," said the fox. "They have guns, and they hunt. It is very disturbing. They also raise chickens. These are their only interests. Are you looking for chickens?"

"No," said the little prince. "I am looking for friends. What does that mean--'tame'?"

"It is an act too often neglected," said the fox. It means to establish ties."

"'To establish ties'?"

"Just that," said the fox. "To me, you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me. To you, I am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world . . ."

"I am beginning to understand," said the little prince. "There is a flower . . . I think that she has tamed me . . ."

"It is possible," said the fox. "On the Earth one sees all sorts of things."

"Oh, but this is not on the Earth!" said the little prince.

The fox seemed perplexed, and very curious.

"On another planet?"

"Yes."

"Are there hunters on that planet?"

"No."

"Ah, that is interesting! Are there chickens?"

"No."

"Nothing is perfect," sighed the fox.

But he came back to his idea.

"My life is very monotonous," the fox said. "I hunt chickens; men hunt me. All the chickens are just alike, and all the men are just alike. And, in consequence, I am a little bored. But if you tame me, it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life. I shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others. Other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground. Yours will call me, like music, out of my burrow. And then look: you see the grain-fields down yonder? I do not eat bread. Wheat is of no use to me. The wheat fields have nothing to say to me. And that is sad. But you have hair that is the color of gold. Think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me! The grain, which is also golden, will bring me back the thought of you. And I shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat . . ."

The fox gazed at the little prince, for a long time.

http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr.../princefox.jpg
"Please--tame me!" he said.

"I want to, very much," the little prince replied. "But I have not much time. I have friends to discover, and a great many things to understand."

"One only understands the things that one tames," said the fox. "Men have no more time to understand anything. They buy things all ready made at the shops. But there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship, and so men have no friends any more. If you want a friend, tame me . . ."

"What must I do, to tame you?" asked the little prince.

"You must be very patient," replied the fox. "First you will sit down at a little distance from me--like that--in the grass. I shall look at you out of the corner of my eye, and you will say nothing. Words are the source of misunderstandings. But you will sit a little closer to me, every day . . ."

The next day the little prince came back.

"It would have been better to come back at the same hour," said the fox. "If, for example, you come at four o'clock in the afternoon, then at three o'clock I shall begin to be happy. I shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances. At four o'clock, I shall already be worrying and jumping about. I shall show you how happy I am! But if you come at just any time, I shall never know at what hour my heart is to be ready to greet you . . . One must observe the proper rites . . ."

"What is a rite?" asked the little prince.

"Those also are actions too often neglected," said the fox. "They are what make one day different from other days, one hour from other hours. There is a rite, for example, among my hunters. Every Thursday they dance with the village girls. So Thursday is a wonderful day for me! I can take a walk as far as the vineyards. But if the hunters danced at just any time, every day would be like every other day, and I should never have any vacation at all."




So the little prince tamed the fox. And when the hour of his departure drew near--

"Ah," said the fox, "I shall cry."

"It is your own fault," said the little prince. "I never wished you any sort of harm; but you wanted me to tame you . . ."

"Yes, that is so," said the fox.

"But now you are going to cry!" said the little prince.

"Yes, that is so," said the fox.

"Then it has done you no good at all!"

"It has done me good," said the fox, "because of the color of the wheat fields." And then he added:

"Go and look again at the roses. You will understand now that yours is unique in all the world. Then come back to say goodbye to me, and I will make you a present of a secret."




The little prince went away, to look again at the roses.

"You are not at all like my rose," he said. "As yet you are nothing. No one has tamed you, and you have tamed no one. You are like my fox when I first knew him. He was only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes. But I have made him my friend, and now he is unique in all the world."

And the roses were very much embarassed.

"You are beautiful, but you are empty," he went on. "One could not die for you. To be sure, an ordinary passerby would think that my rose looked just like you--the rose that belongs to me. But in herself alone she is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses: because it is she that I have watered; because it is she that I have put under the glass globe; because it is she that I have sheltered behind the screen; because it is for her that I have killed the caterpillars (except the two or three that we saved to become butterflies); because it is she that I have listened to, when she grumbled, or boasted, or ever sometimes when she said nothing. Because she is my rose.




And he went back to meet the fox.

"Goodbye," he said.

"Goodbye," said the fox. "And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."

"What is essential is invisible to the eye," the little prince repeated, so that he would be sure to remember.

"It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important."

"It is the time I have wasted for my rose--" said the little prince, so that he would be sure to remember.

"Men have forgotten this truth," said the fox. "But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose . . ."

"I am responsible for my rose," the little prince repeated, so that he would be sure to remember.
I love those chapters too
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...chapter24.html
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...chapter25.html
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...chapter26.html
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...chapter27.html
...and it's the end

Indeed I don't know to speak about this book

[denial]

okay Nath .. thanks .. I give it a ride.. but will take sometimes .. sound like a nice book... and I like fairy tales .. especially with pictures drawing.. thank you.


PS: I got your postcard yesterday ... thank you... I'll find a frame and hang it on the wall too. I love butterflies.

[shizzo]

I love this book!

Strangely enough, I've only read it in French, though. I guess
now'd be the opportune time for the switch...

[nath]

I'm specially happy than someody like you loves it shizzo...and I'm not surprised at all..'cause... you have all the sensibility inside yourself to feel it in a deep and beautiful way...it's oubvious when we read your posts.
Thanks for the Little Prince....

[Veggie Delite]

i love the little prince!!!

it's one of my all time favourite books! and everything that is written there is so true... it's more true than what we hear in the news or read in the newspaper

[denial]

wow .. I have done that book in one night ... wo.. that was an amazing story.. thank you very much Nath .. I like it very very much .. and I think its a true story .. I seriously do .. LoL


..i have a feeling that the flower making noise everyday at that little prince for bringing back the little sheep .. now little prince has to take the flower where ever he goes to protect her .. the sheep however is very small and kind and would like to be friend with the flower but of course .. the flower does not trust the sheep.. so the little sheep keep his distance and wishing everyday that someday the flower will want to be friend with him too...

[Veggie Delite]

i think this book is the perfect present to everyone you care about

[shizzo]

I love the imagery that this book uses. It doesn't oversimplify,
but instead chooses new ways of seeing. A lot of people think of
it as a children's book because it seems so short, so clear - the
best thing to be said about it is that both kids and adults benefit
from the story itself.

My favorite chapter is one of the shortest :
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...chapter18.html

It both expresses the naïveté of something as small and
(seemingly) inconsequential as the flower and also the obvious
logic that the flower has. If normal logic isn't considered. her
reply that men having no roots to hold them down is one of
the most intelligent reasonings in the book.

[500th post!]

[nath]

Originally Posted by shizzo

My favorite chapter is one of the shortest :
http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littlepr...chapter18.html

It both expresses the naïveté of something as small and
(seemingly) inconsequential as the flower and also the obvious
logic that the flower has. If normal logic isn't considered. her
reply that men having no roots to hold them down is one of
the most intelligent reasonings in the book.

[500th post!]

Send just a very sweet & tender smile to you shizzo

[denial]

Nath .. I saw your earlier post that picture of the pilot guy. So it was him? the writer? Brilliant writing that it made us feel boring when *it is* "suppose" to feel boring. And its amazing when mind travel and explore its own world and tell us the story of it journey... not a fiction but just looks like one..

edit:

okay .. I just have to describe it: ( psst .. its the DNA thing! )

- Its a fiction but not a fiction -