Book Review (little Prince).docx

Name: Shara Pamela V. Gesta

Grade & Section: - Forbes

Subject: Reading and Writing Skills

Teacher: Thersalyn Alindajao

Date:

Book Review: The Little Prince By Shara Pamela V. Gesta

The Little Prince is undoubtedly Saint-Exupéry’s most famous work. It has been translated into more than 170 languages and adapted into two operas, a musical film, and an animated television series. The book was commonly referred to as children's bedtime stories but this story was also cherished by the adults for it contains reflections that shows friendship, love, imagination, and the importance of an individual in the world.

Characterization The Little Prince contain characters that are appealing and relatable. The main characters, the pilot and the little prince, were drawn inspired by the author from his own self as an aviator and a youth. Each character in the story shows different characteristics which is related to the society. Each character represents people in our generation that the reader may realize that one of the character of the story presents the same attitude of a person he/she knows. The two characters are drawn together by their common exile—the pilot, who is stranded in the desert, and the Little Prince, who is far from his home on the asteroid B612. Gradually, the narrator learns the Prince’s story. The Prince lived on a small planet, where he spent his days weeding his home of baobab trees, tending to his volcanoes, and most of all, taking care of his rose. This mysterious rose was a delicate but vain creature. She was demanding and pretentious, and despite the Prince’s love for her, he grew disappointed with her capriciousness. When he caught her in a lie one day, he became disenchanted with her and left his planet to go exploring.

Plot The Little Prince is one of the best classic fable books that shows magic, fantasy, adventures and even friendship. Saint-Exupéry, in general, steps the zone of imagination while writing his work. The story starts with a pilot whom encountered an engine problems that causes him land his plane in a desert where he met a goldenhaired boy—the little prince—unexpectedly appears in the vast Sahara. The pilot is anxiously trying to fix the engine, for he has no food or water to survive for long. The author catches the reader’s attention and will make them think of what will happen to the pilot and where the little prince did came from. In the same place, the boy politely asks the pilot to draw him a picture of a sheep. The pilot instead draws a picture from his own childhood: a boa constrictor with an elephant in its stomach. The boy, exasperated, concludes that adults cannot understand anything without numerous explanations. Only after the pilot draws a box with air holes in it is the boy happy. Both the pilot and the little prince understand that a sheep is inside the box. After reading this part, the reader’s perspective, particularly the adults, will be enlightened and voluntarily made them to think of their childhood.

As the story continue, the prince visits six other asteroid-planets, all inhabited by foolish adults. The reader would start visualizing every part of the story. As mentioned, this book contains adventure which means they will meet new characters both good and bad along their way. Through this, readers will fasten-their-seatbelt and expect a jetpack-joyride adventure with the pilot and the little prince.

Art and Delivery Saint-Exupéry also uses descriptive words to describe each character and place of the book. From the pilot, prince, rose, king, geographer, conceited man, fox where each of them shows different characteristics. This is good because it will ignite the reader’s picture out how do they look like. Those describing words helps the readers to expand their thoughts and imagination on what is happening on the story. The art provided by Saint-Exupéry are outstanding and a complement for the book. His drawings about the sheep, boa constrictor with an elephant in its stomach, the baobab trees, the rose, etc. which added more understanding for the reader especially to the part where the prince asks drawing of a sheep. All of the words and art used by the author/illustrator assists the audience to realize the events of the book and boosts their imagination in each situations.

Final Verdict With its good story and excellent art and delivery, I’ll rate the book excellent for me, 5 stars. While reading the story I realize that we cannot truly understand unless we search for meaning ourselves. Someone else can tell us about it, but we need to experience it in order to know what it means. I am not a fan of reading books but for me, this book ignores to be better and chooses to be the best among all SaintExupéry’s books.