The Little Prince

Chapter 4

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In this chapter of The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint Exupéry, the protagonist, who had had an accident while flying his airplane of the Sahara Desert, speculates about the planet from where The Little Prince (who he had met in the desert) had come. He also draws clear distinctions between the perception of a child and the perception of grown-ups. I chose this chapter because not only does it depict a child’s views on adults and their stereotypes, but also the child’s sterotypes about adults.

In the first line of the chapter, the protagonist says he has learnt a “fact of great importance” – that the planet from which the little prince had arrived was the size of a house. This statement throws light on the fact that humans in general and children in particular perceive other people/things in terms of themselves and their belongings. Unlike grown-ups, who would have put a figure on the size of the planet, the protagonist has measured the planet in terms of a house.

He then goes on to write that he has “serious reason” to believe that the planet from which the prince has arrived is an asteroid known as B-612. However, absolutely no evidence or justification is provided to support his conclusion that the little prince was from B-612 (at least at this point of the book), causing me to question whether the protagonist has used valid reasoning to support his claim, or mere speculation.

The protagonist uses History to convince the reader about the existence of the named asteroid, though he is not making any effort to prove that the little prince came from there. He goes back into the year 1909, when a Turkish astronomer had seen the asteroid only once, and had presented his findings to the International Astronomical Congress. But he was dressed in Turkish costume, and therefore nobody believed what he said. This claim has highlighted the prejudices in the minds of the European and American people (who the IAC consisted of) against people of other cultures.

In spite of them being experts in the field of Astronomy, they were not immune to such racist prejudices and stereotypes. It may have been based on the fact that they had perceived some Turkish people in traditional costumes, who were not at all well-versed in The Sciences, and therefore generalized and formed a stereotype that all Turkish people in their traditional clothes are not scientific, and are not worth believing. The fact that the same person’s claim about the asteroid was accepted when he presented it in Western clothes confirms the fact that the members of the IAC had a prejudice rooted in them.

This prejudice could also be formed partly due to emotion. The members may have had slight contempt for the Turkish man in his costume, and also pride in their own Western culture, which would have played a role in the formation of the prejudice and stereotype.

The protagonist then goes on to write about the difference in perceived priorities in knowing in children and grown-ups. While children are inquisitive about qualitative aspects of a person or thing, adults are only interested in quantitative aspects. Giving the example of knowing a friend, the protagonist points out that normally people should be interested in aspects like his hobbies, his voice, whether he collects butterflies or not, but adults are more inquisitive about his age, his weight, and how much money that his father earned. He subtly hints at the fact that adults are only interested in wealth and monetary worth when forming an opinion about a person, house or other thing.

At this point, the protagonist is making a generalization and forming a stereotype of adults. While he may have perceived many adults who are only interested in numbers, even when knowing a person, it is incorrect to brand every adult like that. If this stereotype does exist in his mind, he will only notice those adults who have the mentioned qualities – confirmation bias will influence his perception, and he will not perceive the adults who contradict his stereotype.

In the latter part of the chapter, the protagonist shares his grief with the reader or knower. He has been writing about the past all this while, and he now throws light on his present. He has lost his friend (“I have suffered too much grief in setting down these memories”), the little prince, and experiences extreme sadness. This sorrow expressed by the protagonist translates into sympathy for him in the knower’s mind.

Throughout this chapter, the language used is simple, easily comprehendible, and, at times, child-like. This is done to strike an emotional chord with children, who read this book. The fact that he refers to adults as ‘they’ brings the reader, irrespective of his age, to the child’s side. Thus, the reader perceives the issues dealt with from the point of view of a child.