“When you’re finished washing and dressing each morning, you must tend to your planet. ” The Little Prince’s planet could be a metaphor for a number of things. My interpretation is that the Little Prince living on his own little planet is equal to a person that lives in their mind, or in “their own little world”. So really I view the little planet as a smaller simpler view of the world. And when I apply that perspective to this quote, it takes on a whole new meaning.
The Little Prince spends a few minutes each day tearing up the baobabs that grow on his planet.
As a metaphor, this seems to me to be akin to meditation, or something similar. At least a few minutes each day, I suppose, should be spent in the mind, sorting out one’s thoughts and pulling up the baobabs. If you spend too much time outside your little world in the adult world, there is a good chance that the baobabs will grow too large and outgrow your little world.
“Only children know what they’re looking for… They spend their time on a rag doll and it becomes very important, and if it’s taken away from them, they cry…” Children possess a certain view of things that most adults don’t understand.
A child’s focus is very narrow. The child only sees the here and the now and throws all of his focus upon it.
When the child is given the rag doll, he focuses on the ragdoll and begins to understand it. The ragdoll becomes meaningful to him. That is why the child cries when the ragdoll is taken away. For that moment the ragdoll was his entire world, and his entire world was taken away in an instant. As the child matures and becomes an adult, he learns new things and his point of view broadens. If an adult is given a rag doll, he won’t understand it as the child does.
He has a job and a car and a girlfriend, so a ragdoll does not matter to him. It’s silly for him to be given a rag doll. The adult does not focus on just one thing at a time as the child does. He looks at the broader picture and decides that the here and now are not so important. Furthermore, when the child cries after the ragdoll are taken away, the adult cannot understand why. He does not understand the child’s point of view because he does not understand the child. And perhaps he doesn’t understand the child because he compares the child to other things.
The adults always try to look at the big picture, but maybe the big picture would be easier to look at if they only look at one part at a time.“When I was a little boy, the Christmas tree lights, the music of midnight mass, the tenderness of people’s smiles made up… the whole radiance of the Christmas present I received. ” A point repeated by the author and portrayed nicely in this quote is that tangible things are valueless. It is the experiences surrounding them that makes them important. An example is a narrator and the Little Prince’s journey to the well.
Had the well been closer to his crash site, it would not have tasted as sweet because the experience surrounding it would not have existed. In fact, by the well-being in such close proximity, the narrator’s entire experience would have held much less meaning. But because he had to work and struggle for the well and the repair of his plane, it made the water, and his survival, all the sweeter. Many adults want money and power, but many will not accept the fact that money and power must be earned, and that money and power do not seem worth it without having worked to achieve it.
The Little Prince Analysis. (2019, Dec 05). Retrieved from https://paperap.com/paper-on-the-little-prince-quote-analysis/