The Little Prince – the character and the book – can be deceptive at first glance. The seemingly simple story of the boy-prince, written by Count Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, is a struggle against indifference to the value of human life. The book directly corresponds with the destructive philosophy of the destroyers and builders of worlds of the twentieth century. Against the backdrop of concentration camps and utilitarian gulags, a boy emerged into the world who sought to protect his rose – his first love – and return humanity to the foundations of Greek philosophy.
The Little Prince visits Socrates' planet
The little prince arrived on Earth from his small planet, where he left his beloved rose, whom he misses. On his way, he passes by various stars, where he meets a king who has no one to rule over, a proud man, a drunkard, a businessman who counts and determines all the stars for himself, until the little prince arrives at the smallest planet of all, where there was room “ only for a street lamp and to light lanterns .”1
The lantern-lighter has a serious problem: he has to turn the lanterns on and off every morning and evening. But the rotation of the star around itself is constantly increasing, so that a day lasts one minute – 30 seconds per night, 30 seconds per morning. Despite this, the instructions have not changed, and the instructions must be obeyed.
The lights-turner remains faithful to his job, and therefore, he turns lights on and off every 30 seconds. Unlike the other characters the little prince has met up to that point, he actually likes the lights-turner. Unlike the king, the tyrant, the drunkard, and the businessman, the man who turns the lights on is good – he is a man and he is human. Not too much – just human.
The Little Prince laughs at this strange world of the lantern-lighter, but adds an insight out of sincere appreciation for his work: “ It is a very beautiful craft. And because it is beautiful, it is also useful. ”2
The connection between the beautiful, the useful, and the good – to which the Little Prince refers in The Star of the Lantern – reveals a glimpse of the book's depth. The connection between the beautiful, the useful, and the good formed and continues to form the basis of modern Western culture, based on ancient Greek philosophy.
This is how Plato describes in “ The Symposium ” the connection between beauty and goodness, in accordance with the concept that reality should be in harmony as a whole.3 In ancient Greek philosophy, “beauty” describes a virtue of character (Virtue), and not necessarily an external form. “ He who understands that if he is not beautiful and good he will not retain friendship, it is necessary for him to take care to be virtuous ,”4 as stated in “ The Symposium ” by Xenophon (died 357 BC).
The Philosophers' War of Annihilation over The Little Prince
At the time The Little Prince was published in 1943, a series of thinkers and philosophers declared war on the foundations of Western culture, including the connection between beauty, goodness, and utility. Some wanted to present ugliness as truly beautiful, while others denied the ability to distinguish between beauty and ugliness, and hence between good and evil.
At the head of those thinkers and philosophers stood the Prussian-German thinker, Friedrich Nietzsche, whose weapon was particularly sophisticated - Nietzsche did not abandon these concepts, but made use of the same words, the same expressions, still maintaining the connection between the beautiful, the useful, and the good, but introducing into them a different and new meaning, justifying any atrocity, all this with deliberate conceptual confusion.
Nietzsche – whose entire project was about crushing morality and the definitions of “good” and “bad” that he perceived as meaningless – set as a standard for examining reality – an aesthetic standard. What is beautiful is useful, and if it is useful, it is beautiful.
Ostensibly, this is the same scale as the Little Prince in The Lamplighter's Star, a continuation of the Platonic-Socratic concept, but in practice, Nietzsche's aesthetic concept justifies any atrocity as "beautiful" if it is beneficial, and the Little Prince is a prominent opponent of Nietzsche's concept of beauty.
The Humanity of the Little Prince, Nietzsche's Loss of Humanity
The sharp contradiction between the approaches comes in the form of the inevitable death of the Little Prince, after the Little Prince decides to keep his promise and meet with the snake, so that it will bite him to death, exactly one year after the Little Prince arrived on Earth.
The pilot is not prepared for this, and expresses fear of the feeling of loss.And again I was seized by the freezing cold of a feeling of irreparable loss, and I realized that I could not bear the thought that I would never hear that laughter again.".5
These things stand in complete contrast to Nietzsche's words, and his contempt for human life as such: " Many kinds of animals have passed from the world; suppose man also disappears, nothing will be lacking in him, in the world. Life in general is a blink of an eye... Something careless about the total fate of the earth; the earth itself, like a star, a kind of comma between two non-communities... The worst kind of necessity, the foolish necessity. "6
For the pilot and the little prince, life is not “ something trivial ,” and they are not found on the ground, on the earth that is merely a “ comma .” They have the right setting to embrace this existential despair—stuck in the Sahara desert without water, and facing the inevitable death of the little prince—but the pilot’s thought of not hearing the little prince’s laughter freezes his blood. He cares about the boy. Their relationship is not something “ trivial .”
In contrast to this view, one can find Nietzsche praising the artistic delight in the suffering of others, “and who will achieve anything great if he does not feel within himself the power and the will to inflict great pain! ”7 When it comes to values and humanity in Nietzsche’s world, there is only one option – destruction: “ Here there is no room for any agreement: here the duty is to eliminate, to destroy, to wage war .”8 This is how the “ beautiful ” of the desperate Prussian thinker appears .
There are passages in The Little Prince that constitute an almost explicit verbal struggle against Nietzsche. The innocent little prince, who wants a sheep drawn for him, and worries about the well-being of the rose he left in his little star, is a sharp contrast to Nietzsche’s words: “ This too is a commandment of human love – there are circumstances in which having a child would be a crime: in the case of the chronically ill and the mentally ill of the first degree… This is the duty of society… to bear the responsibility for every failed life before life, – it is also punished for it, and for this it must prevent it. Society’s duty is to prevent fertilization in many cases: it must be prepared for this… by the most severe coercive means, by imprisonment and, in certain circumstances, even by sterilization .”9
Is it conceivable that the Little Prince's very existence is a "crime" as Nietzsche portrays him? The Little Prince – the book – rejects this idea out of hand. The pilot in the Sahara, starving for a drop of water, sees it as a privilege to know this little boy, for his laughter, his beauty, and his golden hair. A few days in the Sahara, which gave the pilot and those who came after him a whole world.
Nietzsche's defeat in the face of The Little Prince
The blatant contradiction between Nietzsche’s and Saint-Exupéry’s conception of beauty and art comes in the form of the ideas of control and power, which Nietzsche praises and The Little Prince rejects. Nietzsche writes: “The Philosopher Artist. A Higher Concept of Art. Is Man Able to Place Himself at Such a Distance from Other Human Beings That They Will Serve as Material for His Design??”.10
This is Nietzsche’s art: design in the flesh. And to be able to design in the flesh – even “with the most severe means of coercion ” – Nietzsche must “ place himself at such a distance from human beings” as to cause such “great pains .” The Little Prince knows the truth that Nietzsche refuses to face – if the “ artist philosopher ” does not keep his distance from human beings, he will not be indifferent, and a person who is not indifferent finds it difficult to abuse.
To sculpt in living flesh, one must become an atom, an object in reality, and thus, the thinker becomes a controlled instrument incapable of changing reality – this is a paradox ! This is the ideological victory of the Little Prince over Nietzsche. Nietzsche reveals himself to the Little Prince as truly small, not someone who has the ability to cause “ great pains ,” but someone who fears the smallest pain himself.
The strong bond between the little prince and the pilot is revealed when the little Prince He is the one who calms the pilot before his death. He knows that the pilot will remember him, like all things hidden from sight, “asThe water, for example. The water you gave me to drink was like a beautiful melody, because of the pulley and the rope.. you remember.. they were good“.11 small moments, which created something greater than the two people who experienced them.
Not too human – definitely human.
The reading of Saint-Exupéry's book is a call to humanity, in a century that turned horror into a spectacle, in which small, frightened people became artists of oppression and sculpting in living flesh, and there is nothing more appropriate to this call to humanity than the things that appear at the end of the book.If you go on a journey in Africa one day, to the desert, and if you happen to be there by chance, please, do not rush, wait a little under the stars! And if a boy approaches you, and laughs, and his hair is the color of gold, and if he does not answer your questions, you will surely guess who he is. Then do me a favor! Don't leave me so sad: write to me quickly that he has returned.".12
On July 31.7.44, XNUMX, de Saint-Exupéry made his last sortie as part of his activities in the French Air Force, from which he never returned.
Footnotes
- “The Little Prince”, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, translation: Ilana Hammerman, Am Oved, 2007, p. 42.
- Ibid., P. 43.
- “The Complete Writings of Plato”, Plato, “The Banquet” Translation: Joseph G. Liebes, Schocken Publishing, 1999, Volume 197, verse 121, page XNUMX.
- “Socratic Dialogs”, as Xenophon, “The Banquet”, translation: Gabriel Danzig, Shalem Publishing, 2002, verse 28, p. 69.
- The Little Prince, p. 75.
- “The Will for Itself”, Friedrich Nietzsche, translation: Dr. Israel Eldad, Schocken Publishing, 1986, volume 302, verses 303-177, pp. 178-XNUMX.
- “The Merry Science”, Friedrich Nietzsche, translation: Dr. Israel Eldad, Schocken Publishing, 325, verse 338, page XNUMX.
- The Desire for Its Own Sake, Volume 51, Verse 37, Page XNUMX.
- Ibid., Volume 734, verse 140, pp. 141-XNUMX.
- Ibid., ibid., verse 795, page 173.
- The Little Prince, p. 75.
- Ibid., P. 83.
A few words about Adi Ben Hur
The writer is a lawyer who practices intellectual property law, privacy protection, and civil law.
Want to read more about “The Little Prince”?
You are invited to read the article The Little Prince and Saint-Exupéry by Sarah Shoham.
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