The Little Prince

The little prince was published in 1940. It’s the world-famous fairy-tale by the French author, Antoine de St-Exupery, The Little Prince.

As many other fairy-tales, the outline of The Little Prince is not very complex. “I”, the narrator of the story, is a pilot whose plane has something wrong and lands in the Sahara. In this occasion, the pilot makes the

acquaintance of the little prince, a little boy from another planet, the Asteroid B612. The little prince has escaped from his tiny planet, because he has some quarrel with a rose, which grows on his planet. In that case he left his own planet and took an exploration at some neighbor asteroids.

On his all-alone journey, the little prince meets different kinds of people, which includes a king, a conceited man, a tippler, a businessman, a lamplighter and a geographer. From these people he gets a conclusion that the grown-ups are very odd. Following the instruction of the geographer, he descends in the Sahara, on the earth.

Traveling on the earth, the little prince, who sees a garden of

five-thousand roses, is overcome with astonishment and sadness, as he

considers his rose is unique in the universe before. At that time a fox appears. The fox, who tell the little prince about the meaning of the word “tame”,

becomes his new friend. At the time to say farewell, the fox makes him know that his rose is unique because she is his rose and tamed by him. From that the little prince begins to treasure friendship and be responsible to his rose.

At the anniversary day of his descent of the earth, rejecting the pilot’s advice, he goes back to his own planet by bite of a snake. “It’s too far. I can not carry this body with me. It’s too heavy.” he said. He tells his friend, the pilot, he must be responsible for his rose, so he has to go back. At the end the author doesn’t tell us the ending directly. Maybe it’s more significant for us to imagine.

 

第二篇：The Little Prince读后感

Book Report of The Little Prince

The Little Prince , first published in 1943, is a novella and the most famous work of the French aristocrat, writer, poet and pioneering aviator Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944).The novella is both the most read and most translated book in the French language, and was voted the best book of the 20th century in France. Translated into more than 250 languages and dialects,selling over a million copies per year with sales totaling over 200 million copies worldwide, it has become one of the best-selling books ever published.

Saint-Exupéry, a laureate of several of France's highest literary awards and a reserve military pilot at the start of the Second World War, wrote and illustrated the manuscript while exiled in the United States after the Fall of France. He had traveled there on a personal mission to convince its government to quickly enter the war against Nazi Germany. In the midst of personal upheavals and failing health he produced almost half of the writings he would be remembered for, including a tender tale of loneliness, friendship, love and loss, in the form of a young prince fallen to Earth.

An earlier memoir by the author recounted his aviation experiences in the Sahara desert and he is thought to have drawn

on those same experiences for use as plot elements in The Little Prince. Since first being published the novella has been adapted to various media over the decades, including audio recordings, stage, screen, ballet, and operatic works.

The reader is introduced to the narrator who, as a young boy, drew a boa constrictor digesting an elephant. However, he is discouraged from drawing when all adults who look at his picture see a hat, instead. The narrator attempts to explain what his first picture depicts by drawing another one clearly showing the elephant, disturbing the adults as a result. As such, he decides to become a pilot, which eventually leads to a crash in the Sahara desert.

In the desert, the narrator meets the little prince, who asks him to draw a sheep. Not knowing how to draw a sheep, the narrator shows him the picture of the elephant in the snake. To the narrator's surprise, the prince recognizes the drawing for what it is. After a few failed attempts at drawing a sheep, the narrator draws a box in his frustration, claims that the box holds a sheep inside. Again to the narrator's surprise, the prince is delighted with the result.

The little prince's home asteroid, or "planet", is introduced. After he reconciles with his rose, the prince leaves to see what the rest

of the universe is like. He visits six other asteroids, each of which is inhabited by a foolish adult.On the Earth, the prince meets a snake that claims to have the power to return him to his home planet, though the prince refuses this offer.Eventually, the prince comes upon a whole row of rosebushes, and becomes downcast because he thought his rose was unique.The prince then comes across a railway switchman and a merchant. Back in the present, the narrator is dying of thirst, but finds a well with the help of the prince. The narrator later finds the prince discussing his return home with the snake. The prince bids an emotional farewell to the narrator and states that if it looks as though he has died, it is because his body is too heavy to take with him to his planet. The prince warns the narrator not to watch him leave, as it will make him sad. The narrator, realizing what will happen, refuses to leave the prince's side. The prince allows the snake to bite him, and falls without making a sound. The next morning, the narrator tries to look for the prince, but is unable to find his body. The story ends with a portrait of the landscape where the prince and the narrator met and where the snake took the prince's life. The narrator makes a plea that anyone encountering a strange child in that area who refuses to answer questions should contact the narrator immediately.

Though ostensibly a children's book, The Little Prince makes several profound and idealistic observations about life and human nature. For example, Saint-Exupéry tells of a fox meeting the young prince during his travels on Earth. The story's essence is contained in the lines uttered by the fox to the little prince: On ne voit bien qu'avec le c?ur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux. ("One sees clearly only with the heart. What is essential is invisible to the eye.") Other key thematic messages are articulated by the fox, such as: "You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed" and "It is the time you have devoted to your rose that makes your rose so important." The Fox's messages are arguably the most famous due to its nature of dealing with relationships.