The Little Prince

The Little Prince is a very delicate story. It could be taken in so many ways from so many different perspectives where it shows how a child views the world that we live in and the simple thoughts that we often take for granted. It shows how adult perspective is unimaginative and dull while the childish perspective is creative and open to the mysteries of the universe. It got my mind working and thinking of how each line meant for me, and made me realize that it actually has some deeper way of teaching us of what is truly essential in our lives.

The narrator landed on the sahara desert all by himself. His loneliness made me think of how important relationships with others are. He was alone, until the little prince came out of nowhere and soon enabled him to embrace the lessons his new friend has to offer. He showed the little prince his drawing of a boa constrictor devouring an elephant and was amazed that the he was able to get the point of his drawing. That part explained how children are very imaginative unlike adults. They talked about the little prince’s planet and mentioned about the baobab trees that remains as a threat to the his planet. The little prince notes that one must be very careful of one’s planet since all planets have good plants and bad plants. Bad plants must be uprooted before they start to grow and crush everything around them. Baobabs, to me, are everyday barriers and obstacles in life that, if left unchecked, can crush a person. He also talked about the rose that occupied his thoughts and heart all throughout his travel. He loves her so much but doubted the sincerity of her love which made him leave.

The rose was vain and naive, and had trouble expressing her love for the little prince. We all know that children are too young and inexperienced to understand love. In his journey, he encounters different person in various planets which symbolizes a particular characteristic of adults. He met a king which represents a political figure who possessed a need of power and domination; a vain man which represents adults with their limited views and don’t know what they truly need in their lives; a drunkard who seemed trapped against his will and the fact that he drinks to forget that he is ashamed of his drinking is absurd and irrational; a businessman who shows the flaws of the grown-up world and how preoccupied they are with meaningless pursuits; a lamplighter which represents a tragic figure who blindly follows orders that are obsolete; and a geographer whose understanding of duty and profession is flawed that claims to know everything, but knows very little. When the little prince reached Earth, he saw a snake which constantly speaks in riddles and ultimately sends the prince back to the heavens by biting him. The prince’s discovery of the rose garden illustrates how painful some lessons can be.

His discovery that his rose is quite ordinary makes him feel pain. Along with his unhappiness, a fox appears. The fox was way more knowledgeable than the narrator and the little prince. He helped the prince toward what is important in life and made him realize three things: only the heart can see correctly; the prince’s time away from his planet has made him appreciate his rose more; and love entails responsibility. The search for the well in the desert makes it clear that people must discover the true meaning of things for themselves in order for those things to have value. The story of the little prince ends in a mystery, however, it insists that relationships are worth the trouble. The Little Prince, though it deals with serious and even upsetting issues, emphasizes the idea that good can be derived from sad events. The little prince learns that his rose must die, but this knowledge fires his love for her. The relationship between the narrator and the prince reaches new levels of intensity only after the prince makes it clear that he will depart.

The story is philosophical and inspiring. It requires us to reflect on our own and ponder on what is happening in our lives. Are we like the pilot who almost forgot a part of him and at some point forgot who he should be? It reminds us that we should never lose the child in us. I have learned a lot and when I reached the ending, the line “But there is no shop where one can buy friendship, and so man have no friends anymore…if you want a friend tame me” made me realize that friendship is not just something you can easily get or ask for, you have to work hard for it. It made me value my friends even more because I know that they wouldn’t be my friends if I/they – we didn’t tame each other. People sometimes just go around without appreciating the simple things that they should be thankful for. Instead, they indulge on those things that they thought is important but in reality, it is not. That is why, even though we do things like working, drinking, being vain and conceited, we never really feel truly happy. Sometimes, we have to look into a child’s mind to truly appreciate the beauty of life.