Grown-ups love figures. When you describe a new friend to them, they never ask you about the important things. They never say: 'What's his voice like? What are his favourite games? Does he collect butterflies?' Instead they demand: 'How old is he? How many brothers has he? How much does he weigh? How much does his father earn?' Only then do they feel they know him. If you say to the grown-ups: 'I've seen a lovely house made of pink brick, with geraniums in the windows and doves on the roof', they are unable to picture such a house. You must say: 'I saw a house that cost a hundred thousand francs.' Then they cry out: 'Oh, how pretty!'I am deeply indebted to my dear brother Tim for reminding me of this passage at Christmas.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince
See also Byron's post on Dickens on Butterflies.
8 comments:
Oi. Credit where credit is due - it took me to remind you of this passage and pull it out and read it to you at Christmas.
Are you going to give due credit to your friend who asks people what their favourite colour is and whether they like butterflies?
And yes, credit to him too for reminding me about it back in 2001 in a way that I never forgot it.
Who was the friend and how did he remind you? (Since Tim mightn't see this comment, you might have to answer Lara)
Byron - sorry, I answered back on your blog.
But basically, instead of asking people where they worked, he asked if they liked butterflies and what their favourite colour was. And he quoted this section of The Little Prince as his reason.
Challenging.
I like it.
Est-ce que tu m'as dit, il y a longtemps, que tu veux lire Le Petit Prince en français? Did you ever get around to it?
My copy is still sitting on the shelf waiting to be read.
I did read some of it in French back in high school. Haven't done it lately!
Dessine-moi un mouton! - Draw me a sheep!
That's about all I could do...
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