Star quality

Just as its enigmatic author predicted, nothing in the universe can be the same for those who love 'The Little Prince' -- but why?

By Debra Ollivier

Dec 22, 1998 | One day last September two fishermen were hauling nets off the coast of Marseilles when they found a silver chain bracelet tangled in their lines. Amid much controversy, the bracelet was identified as belonging to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, the legendary aviator and author of "The Little Prince," who flew into the skies off the coast of Bastia in 1944 and never returned. This talisman dredged up from its undiscovered watery grave (years of searching for the site of Saint-Exupéry's plane crash had been in vain) set off a flurry of stories in France on what remains one of the great stars in the firmament of children's literature. More than 50 million copies of "The Little Prince" have been sold since its publication in 1943, the year before its author's disappearance; every year an additional 1 million copies are bought. The book has been translated into 102 languages and dialects, including Esperanto, Congolese and Sardinian. Several film versions have been produced (a Paramount film with Bob Fosse and Gene Wilder, and a Nickelodeon cartoon series, among others), and the likeness of the little prince can be found on the new French 50-franc bill, on CD-ROMs and videos, and on bed linen, watches, address books, figurines, dolls, wallpaper, postcards, backpacks, notebooks and keychains. Editors at Gallimard, France's biggest publisher and home to "The Little Prince," are stumped by the book's unflagging success over the decades. "We really can't explain the phenomenon," says Philip Lezaud. "It's one of those mysteries. The book has an aura about it. It is almost inexplicable." Indeed, how does a seemingly simple tale about an infinitely melancholic little boy on a tiny asteroid compete in the antic and overcrowded zoo of children's marketing?

Part of the mystery lies in the enduring appeal of fables, universal tales that underscore human foibles and follies with a dose of morality thrown in. In the little prince's case, the stupefying characters he encounters on his travels through the universe, consumed by their meaningless preoccupations, could very well be you and me: the businessman who administers stars without accounting for their beauty, the king who rules over nobody, the train switchman who operates speeding trains full of people "pursuing nothing at all" or the merchant who sells pills that save time -- exactly 53 minutes -- by quenching thirst. ("As for me," says the prince, "if I had fifty-three minutes to spend as I liked, I should walk at my leisure toward a spring of fresh water.")

Next Page: "I am a little like the grown-ups. I have had to grow old."

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