About "The Little Prince" by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

December 22, 2023

We have just one more week left in the year, haven't we? Various events have unfolded, with the most significant for me being a hospitalization due to illness in March. Though it was a brief stay―three days in the ICU and five on the general ward―it was a profound experience.

Today, I'd like to share my thoughts on a book, and the theme is unexpectedly "The Little Prince." Originally published in the Iwanami Shonen Bunko series, it seems to target a younger audience. In my case, I've been listening to it on the audiobook app called "Audible."

The reason this work caught my interest is the overlap with my hospitalization experience. The author's experience of crash-landing in the Sahara Desert with a small plane and my ICU stay share striking similarities. Of course, my situation pales in comparison to Saint-Exupéry's. The vast, uninhabited desert, stranded in the pitch-black darkness a thousand miles from human habitation, contrasts with my circumstances of being saved in five hours from the onset of a heart attack, with about ten minutes of critical symptoms.

In the Sahara Desert, even it was described as pitch-black, while the earth may be completely dark, the sky still holds the moon and stars, and the author could have a sense of beauty in that. And there he encounters "The Little Prince." The prince has beautiful golden hair that shines like wheat, and his life is fleeting. He departs for his own planet without suffering, thanks to the gentle poison of a snake. So now, somewhere among the stars I gaze upon, the prince exists, along with the precious rose he parted with (though it might not be a rose). Thus, the stars in the sky are laughing like bells.

The author, Saint-Exupéry, crash-landed in the Sahara with only a week's worth of drinking water. Miraculously, he managed to fix the engine and survive. He was saved but it seems his life mirrors that of the Little Prince, who, with the snake's rescuing poison, returned to his star. And it looks like the flower with four thorns, protecting itself, represent the author's departed lover?

When crashing in a plane in the desert or when being admitted to the ICU with a heart attack, one's possessions reduce to mere "memories." Memories of a red flower with four thorns. And one can also encounter their ephemeral life there.

But once saved, one returns to the "busy, busy" self. Reflecting, Christmas and New Year might be times when we truly encounter ourselves, or in other words, the Little Prince.

Merry Christmas and wishing everyone a wonderful year ahead!

（Note: I wrote this diary without any research, so please pardon any misunderstandings about the author or the work!）