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The Little PrinceAntoine Marie Roger De Saint-Exupery (French)Point of ViewThe point of view in the story is actually told through first-person, in the wordsof the narrator who gets stranded in the Sahara desert. Although parts of thestory tend to sound as if they are being told in an omniscient style, like whenthe Little Prince ventures from the various asteroids, the telling of theseexperiences is based on what the narrator has learned while he is with the LittlePrince himself. For example, at one part, when the narrator describes hissituation: "I realized clearly that something extraordinary was happening. I washolding him close in my arms as if he were a little child; and yet it seemed to methat he was rushing headlong toward an abyss from which I could do nothing torestrain him..." That is a line (and not a quote) that would only appear in thenarration of a first-person point of view story.Dramatic ConflictThe protagonist, the little prince, has quite the most prominent character traitof innocence. Though he is extremely thoughtful, intelligent, and curious as well,it is his vast uninvolvement in the worldly, mechanical concepts in life peoplehave no longer been questioning that allows him to understand our society,unblocked from other things. In other words, this childish innocence of his allowshim to keep asking the questions and recieving the answers that allow the conflictto develop throughout the novel. Although there are many smaller conflicts, aftermuch questioning I have been led to believe that the prominent conflict in TheLittle Prince is man versus man - more specifically, children and their moralsversus those of the adults. On earth, the little prince ventures to a trainstation and meets a railway switchman. He continuously prods the railway switchmanwith questions, not knowing how bothersome he might be and oblivious to what isthe 'sensible' level of questions one might ask an older, more experienced person.Perhaps the railway switchman understands the little prince's childish innocence,so he continues answering his inquiries. He asks the switchman why the people andtrains keep exchanging: "'Were they not satisfied where they were?' ...'No one isever satisfied where he is,'" the switchman replies. A little later in theconversation, the little prince says, "'Only the children know what they arelooking for.' 'They waste their

time over a rag doll and it becomes very important to them; and if anybody takesit away from them, they cry...' 'They are lucky,' the switchman said." Because thechildren have something to pursue, like these children that have lost their ragdolls, know what they are looking for and are not unsatisfied or preoccupied withother worldly matters, such as the quest for wealth and power. They are satisfiedwith their rag dolls and are searching for just that in order to achieve happinessand satisfaction. The depicted adults, however, are occupied with their endlessprospects of gaining more wealth, power, and mundane objects. This is just one ofthe examples that adds onto the developing conflict of children versus adults. Ihave witnessed this kind of wanting, even in my own family - I know for a factthat my older sister and I were always wanting more things - money, clothes,accessories, and so on. It can't really be helped, because this outside worlddemands that we 'improve' ourselves with these things. But while we were wishingwe had more, our little sisters would be playing with their toys or pets, notlooking through clothes catalogs or asking for money. And quite apparently, theywere the ones that were happy - happy before we got those 'to-die-for' pants andhappy while we had them, even though we would just long for shoes to match thosepants. Being unhappy moves in a cycle - an unhappiness caused by thisunsatisfactory state of continous wanting (and the thin line between needing). Inthis scenario, my sister and I play the role of the adults, while my youngersisters play the children. This sort of cycle is like that of the depicted adultsin The Little Prince businessmen greedy to count their wealth, kings greedy to ownthe stars when wealth really cannot be counted and stars never owned. When thelittle prince meets a snake in the desert, they courteously begin a conversation.They talk about the loneliness of the desert, and how it is like the loneliness ofmen, where physical barriers do not make a difference in isolating the adults. Thesnake says, "'...But you are innocent and true, and you come from a star...Youmove me to pity - you are so weak on this Earth made of granite.'" First of all,the snake is touched by the little prince because he is kind and innocent - notafraid of this creature that so many others have feared. When he spoke of 'beingweak on an Earth made of granite,' he again was speaking of the little prince'sfrail innocence. The 'granite' he says it consists of is the rigid, stereotypes ofEarth, a pollution from the depicted adults with their fact and figure-basedideas. The little prince represents the children here, as the children hold theminority of ideas thought to be 'important' in the world because they are notthought of as significant - yet, if they paid more attention to this way of seeingthrough the outside, this Earth may be made of gold, rather than granite!Theme"When a mystery is too overpowering, one dare not disobey." That is the mystery ofThe Little Prince, a novel that represents and emphasizes some of the many rolesof aspects in life - such as honesty, loneliness, hate, success, love, compassion,fear, regret - and has a strange power to portray them with extreme precision. Ihave learned so much about life from this richly-themed novel that since readingit, I have been seeing and

understanding the world differently. The first main principle I learned from TheLittle Prince is simply to see with your heart and imagination rather than witheyes, facts, and figures. With the author's depiction of adults, lonely people whohave lost their ability to understand and make their surroundings into beyond whatthey are on the surface, the little prince and the narrator alike understand thisloneliness as inability to perceive beyond. The adults he meets are so lost andalone without even knowing so because they rely only figures to prove something,whereas in the children's world, emotions and 'matters of consequence' are viewedupon with imagination and a relative understanding (something you don't need tosee to know that it exists). To be able to think like the children do is a traitmuch worth seeking, though. When the little prince was about to depart from a foxhe met that had wished to be tamed by him, he was left with this: "'And now hereis my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can seerightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.'" A fox, that has spent itsdays observing men and their habits, surely would have derived the morals thatgovern the people that can se life for more than wealth and status. Unlike thechildren and people who know what their goals are, the adults depicted are alwayswistful of other things - money, power, material, and mundane objects. The secondimportant theme I have learned from The Little Prince is not to let all the newdevelopments and material things our rapidly developing society has to offer takeaway that which has always been most important in life. When the little princemeets the merchant selling pills, which he claims will quench thirst, saving acalculated fifty-three minutes from every week spent drinking, he asks, "'And whatdo I do with those fifty-three minutes?' 'Anything you like...' 'As for me,' saidthe little prince to himself, 'if I had fifty-three minutes to spend as I liked, Ishould walk at my leisure toward a spring of fresh water.'" People in modernsociety have developed such things that advertising claims to make their liveseasier and more efficient. They drink bottled water and eat pre-packaged meals;and they would much rather prefer taking diet pills than exercising off extrapounds. "How old fashioned," most of us would probably reply to the littleprince's desire to use those extra minutes to walk to a fresh spring. But thiskind of stay-convenient and technologically-dependent attitude of modern societyis what may very well lead to a foreshadowed depression (and has already begun itsprocess) - if anything at all. Yet another important message I wanted to mentionthat relates to the latter theme is the extreme importance of preserving truefriendship in our lives, which is quickly fading. Being a friend will give anunfallible uniqueness and undying quality to life that nothing else can imitate.During