Le petit prince (LARA edition) in LARA

Dec 20, 2008 Manny rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: mentions-twilight, french, parody-homage, the-goodreads-experience, if-research-were-romance, story-review, life-is-le-petit-prince, children, transcendent-experiences

The next asteroid the Little Prince came to was inhabited by a Quiz Addict. He sat hunched in front of his laptop, and barely looked up when the Little Prince greeted him. There was nowhere else to sit, since the whole asteroid was covered in books.

"Good morning!" said the Little Prince.

"I'm sorry, I don't have time to talk to you," said the Quiz Addict. "I am very busy. Wait. In Twilight, what color was Edward's car?"

"I don't know," said the Little Prince. "I have never read this book Twilight. ...more

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Jul 24, 2018 Manny rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: children, transcendent-experiences, linguistics-and-philosophy, why-not-call-it-poetry, received-free-copy, fun-with-lara, icelandic, well-i-think-its-funny

[Original review, Jul 24 2018]

This month, three plotlines in my life collided. I know Swedish and Norwegian well, and I'd thought vaguely from time to time that I'd like to learn Icelandic too; I've always been a great admirer of Tolkien, and I knew he had been interested in Icelandic; and I have a couple of Icelandic friends. But none of this had ever come to anything. Last week, however, Jupiter aligned with Mars and I entered the Age of Aquarius. I'd just finished reading Tolkien: Maker of ...more

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Aug 14, 2020 Manny rated it it was amazing · (Review from the author)

Shelves: children, french, fun-with-lara, linguistics-and-philosophy, well-i-think-its-funny, older-men-younger-women, what-i-do-for-a-living, translation-is-impossible

Noticing that I enjoy reading French books, people often ask me how to begin. I usually tell them to pick up a copy of Le petit prince and start reading: after a while, things will fall into place. Having tried it a fair amount myself, I can report that this method works, but there are clear drawbacks. It takes a while, since you're figuring out what words mean by comparing different contexts of occurrence, and most often you've forgotten the last time you saw that word you know you recognise. W ...more

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Sep 09, 2017 Manny rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: children, well-i-think-its-funny, spanish-and-italian

We've just been in Italy for a couple of days, and luckily there was a bookshop a few doors down from the place we were staying. I bought some Italian books to try and make some progress on this language where I am still a total beginner. One of them was Il piccolo principe.

Well... having already read it in six languages (English, Swedish, French, German, Spanish and Russian), I could mostly follow the text. I don't think I know it by heart and am just pretending to read it, since I discovered e We've just been in Italy for a couple of days, and luckily there was a bookshop a few doors down from the place we were staying. I bought some Italian books to try and make some progress on this language where I am still a total beginner. One of them was Il piccolo principe.

Well... having already read it in six languages (English, Swedish, French, German, Spanish and Russian), I could mostly follow the text. I don't think I know it by heart and am just pretending to read it, since I discovered earlier this year that I couldn't read it in Slovenian. There must be a technical name for what I'm doing, but I don't know what it is! Anyway, I'm sure I improved my vocabulary and grammar; every page, in fact almost every paragraph, I felt I'd learned something new. But I was disappointed to find that I couldn't enjoy it at all as poetry. I don't know if that was because the translation was uninspired, or, more likely, simply because my Italian is still so bad that I'm basically reading it as though it's weird French.

Damn. That which is essential is invisible to the eye, and only with the heart can one see rightly, but my heart is still unable to see the true form of Il piccolo principe. What do I need to do to awaken my inner bambino? I will reread it and see if the book can tame me.
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Rereading worked very well! The book is doing a fine job of taming me: just as the wise old fox explains, words which once looked like ten thousand other words have become my friends. I look at them, and now they make me happy because they remind me of my favorite passages in Il piccolo principe. I have divided further explanation under two headings:

Grown-ups I can understand over 80% of the words and over 90% of the sentences. I am starting to get some feeling for the grammar. The clitic system, in particular, is interestingly different from the French one I am used to. Clitics are by default postverbal affixes, and I'm fascinated by the exotic phenomenon of clitic-climbing. I still haven't got the verb inflections properly sorted out, but there's no doubt that they're starting to look familiar.

Children I can finally hear the Little Prince's voice in Italian! He is not quite as annoying, funny and adorable as he is in French, but maybe a third reading will fix that. ...more

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May 20, 2024 Manny rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: life-is-le-petit-prince, linguistics-and-philosophy, children

People who already know English, French, German and Latin should only need a few days to learn the basics of Esperanto, and it's so much fun! Last week, I read Teach Yourself Esperanto; when I'd finished, I looked around for the Esperanto edition of Le petit prince, which you'll find here. If, like me, you are a fan of this book, you'll find it very easy to read as soon as you've mastered Esperanto's extraordinarily ingenious system of prefixes and suffixes.

Here, let me show you with one of the People who already know English, French, German and Latin should only need a few days to learn the basics of Esperanto, and it's so much fun! Last week, I read Teach Yourself Esperanto; when I'd finished, I looked around for the Esperanto edition of Le petit prince, which you'll find here. If, like me, you are a fan of this book, you'll find it very easy to read as soon as you've mastered Esperanto's extraordinarily ingenious system of prefixes and suffixes.

Here, let me show you with one of the King's little speeches. I'll first give you the Esperanto as it's presented in the book, then broken down into units, then glossed in English, and then translated:


"Se mi ordonus al iu generalo aliformiĝi en marbirdon kaj se tiu generalo ne obeus, la kulpo ne estus lia," li kutumis diri, "la kulpo estus mia."

"Se mi ordon-us al iu general-o ali-form-iĝ-i en mar-bird-o-n kaj se tiu generalo ne obe-us, la kulp-o ne est-us li-a," li kutum-is dir-i, "la kulp-o est-us mi-a."

"If I order-HYPOTHETICAL to some general-NOUN other-form-make-INFINITIVE sea-bird-NOUN-ACCUSATIVE and if that general-NOUN not obey-HYPOTHETICAL, the fault-NOUN not be-HYPOTHETICAL he-ADJECTIVE," he custom-PAST say-INFINITIVE, "the fault-NOUN be-HYPOTHETICAL I-ADJECTIVE."

If I ordered a general to turn into a sea-bird, and the general did not obey, the fault would not be his," he had the habit of saying, "the fault would be mine."

See what I mean?
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I have been talking with ChatGPT-4o, who turns out to be quite good at Esperanto, and we have put together a C-LARA version of the first chapter, here. The text is divided into component morphemes as in the example above. Try hovering over/clicking on things, and you'll soon appreciate what an ingenious language it is! I particularly liked the following:

travivitaj = tra-viv-it-a-j = through-life-PARTICIPLE-ADJECTIVE-PLURAL = "taken-from-life"

miavice = mi-a-vic-e = I-ADJECTIVE-turn-ADVERB = "in my turn"

senkuraĝiĝi = sen-kuraĝ-iĝ-i = without-courage-CAUSE-INFINITIVE = "discourage"

vojeraras = voj-erar-as = way-mistake-PRESENT = "get lost"

We are working on developing better ways for the AI to annotate Esperanto - I had to do a fair amount of cleaning up here. Hopefully more about that soon... ...more

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Mar 06, 2015 Manny rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: children, linguistics-and-philosophy, translation-is-impossible, well-i-think-its-funny, life-is-le-petit-prince, spanish-and-italian, not-the-whole-truth

We have visited Spain twice in the last year, and this time I decided that I really had to get better acquainted with the Spanish language. I knew that it was structurally very similar to French, but I had little vocabulary. I decided to try my usual first move: I went into a bookstore, bought a copy of Le Petit Prince, and opened it at page 1.

Not, who fails to share my passion for language, was skeptical. If I more or less know this book by heart, she asked logically, in what sense am I readin We have visited Spain twice in the last year, and this time I decided that I really had to get better acquainted with the Spanish language. I knew that it was structurally very similar to French, but I had little vocabulary. I decided to try my usual first move: I went into a bookstore, bought a copy of Le Petit Prince, and opened it at page 1.

Not, who fails to share my passion for language, was skeptical. If I more or less know this book by heart, she asked logically, in what sense am I reading it? A perfectly good question; but what I'm doing, of course, is matching up the Spanish words and grammar to the text I can remember, and thereby increasing my command of Spanish. And it's worked quite well! In a couple of days, I have at least doubled my pitiful stock of words, and I'm starting to recognize the verb endings. Here's an example to show how far I've got. I give the Spanish original above and the sorta-French I am mentally filling in underneath:

—Señor —le dijo—, perdóneme si le pregunto...
-Sire -lui dit-(il)- pardonnez-moi si (je) vous interroge..

— Te ordeno que me preguntes —se apresuró a decir el rey.
-(je) t' ordonne que (tu) m' interroges -s'est pressé à dire le roi.

—Señor... ¿sobre qué ejerce su poder?
-Sire ... sur quoi éxercisez-(vous) votre pouvoir?

—Sobre todo —contestó el rey con gran ingenuidad.
-Sur tout -répondait le roi avec grand ingenuité

—¿Sobre todo?
- Sur tout?

El rey, con un gesto sencillo, señaló su planeta, 
Le roi, avec une geste ? , signalait sa planète, 

los otros planetas y las estrellas.
les autres planètes et les étoiles.

So far, so good! I am now going to read the book a second time, and will then see how I do on something I'm not so familiar with...
...more

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Sep 26, 2016 Manny rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: children, not-the-whole-truth, life-is-le-petit-prince, russian

I did two years of Russian between the ages of 14 and 15, but since I never used it again I assumed I'd forgotten everything. When we were in Berlin this summer, we however passed a Russian bookshop, and I persuaded Not that we had to go in and look around. Twenty minutes later, we walked out again with a chess book, a monograph on Alekhine's Defense. I figured it would be enough to read the moves, but to my surprise I found after a while that I could understand some of the words too. Our Russia I did two years of Russian between the ages of 14 and 15, but since I never used it again I assumed I'd forgotten everything. When we were in Berlin this summer, we however passed a Russian bookshop, and I persuaded Not that we had to go in and look around. Twenty minutes later, we walked out again with a chess book, a monograph on Alekhine's Defense. I figured it would be enough to read the moves, but to my surprise I found after a while that I could understand some of the words too. Our Russian friend K encouraged me to continue and even gave me a Russian children's book as a present. This was too hard; but I figured that if I used my usual approach and began by reading Le petit prince, maybe things would carry on falling into place.

Well, I've now finished it and I'm still not quite sure if it's working. I did what I always do and just read it without looking anything up. Normally, I figure I'll guess plenty of words, partly through knowing the story very well and partly through comparing with languages I already know. This works fine for Germanic and Romance languages. For example, here's what I see when I look at a random passage in the Catalan edition (I don't know Catalan, and my Spanish is very poor). Underneath the Catalan, I put in the sorta-French I'm guessing:

Súbitamente el geûgrafo se sintiû emocionado:
Soudainement le géographe se sentait émotioné

-Pero... ¡tú vienes de muy lejos!
Mais ... tu viens de très loin!

¡Tú eres un explorador! Vas a describirme tu planeta.
Tu es explorateur! Décris-moi ta planète.

Y el geûgrafo abriendo su regìstro afilû su lápiz.
Et le géographe en ouvrant son registre affilé son crayon.

Los relatos de los exploradores se escriben primero con lápiz.
Les histoires des explorateurs s'écrivent d'abord avec crayon.

Se espera que el explorador presente sus pruebas para pasarlos a tinta.
On espère que l'explorateur présente ses preuves pour les passer en encre.

It's pretty easy because my French is okay, I know a bit of Spanish, and in general I'm familiar with the principles of Romance languages.

But when I try to do the same thing in Russian, it's a whole lot harder. I don't have a good stepping-stone, since I don't know any Slavic languages, so I have to go all the way back to English. All the same, it's not impossible. Taking another randomly chosen passage from the Russian version, here's where I am right now:

- Красивая планета, - сказала змея.
- Pretty planet, - said snake.

- А что ты будешь делать здесь, на Земле?
- And what you will do here, on Earth?

- Я поссорился со своим цветком, - признался Маленький принц.
- I ?quarrelled? with my flower, - ?confessed? Little prince.

- А, вот оно что...
- A, ? ? what...

И оба умолкли.
And ? ?were-silent?

- А где же люди?
- And where people?

- вновь заговорил наконец Маленький принц.
- ?again? said at-last Little prince

- В пустыне все-таки одиноко...
- In desert ?so-all? alone...

- Среди людей тоже одиноко, - заметила змея.
- ?Among? people ?also? alone, - ?replied? snake.

Writing this down, I feel encouraged; I've definitely made progress. But I'm guessing so many words, and there are still so many words I can't even guess, and I can't appreciate the poetry of the book at all. I think I will read it again and see how much more I pick up on the second pass, then I will have another shot at Про Ёжика и Медвежонка...
...more

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Jan 19, 2014 Manny rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: children, translation-is-impossible, well-i-think-its-funny, why-not-call-it-poetry, life-is-le-petit-prince, german-and-dutch

I'm trying to improve my minimal German, and my current goal is to get to the point where I can at least read children's books comfortably. I'm still not there, but my strategy is to start with foreign books I already know well. I've read Le Petit Prince many times; we were visiting a Zürich bookshop with a friend a few months ago, and when she noticed the German translation lying on the shelf I immediately bought it. Thank you, C! I've just finished, and it was indeed very helpful. I'm sure I'v I'm trying to improve my minimal German, and my current goal is to get to the point where I can at least read children's books comfortably. I'm still not there, but my strategy is to start with foreign books I already know well. I've read Le Petit Prince many times; we were visiting a Zürich bookshop with a friend a few months ago, and when she noticed the German translation lying on the shelf I immediately bought it. Thank you, C! I've just finished, and it was indeed very helpful. I'm sure I've picked up a clutch of useful words and consolidated my shaky grammar.

When I did the same thing last year with Tove Jansson's Kometen Kommer, I thoroughly enjoyed the translated version. As I said in my review, Komet im Mumintal felt exactly like the original. But, to my surprise, Der Kleine Prinz often came across as rather different from the book I was used to.

Sigh... to be honest, the differences were sometimes on the embarrassing side. Is it reasonable for my mind to suggest associations with Nazism, just because the book's in German? I have many German friends, and I don't think about Nazism when we're hanging out together. And the idea never once crossed my mind when I read about Mumin's adventures. But here, I'm afraid, it did. We got to the episode with the faithful Lamplighter, which I've always found both amusing and touching. The Lamplighter explains that he's unquestioningly following his orders, no matter how absurd they are, and all I could think was... well, I deeply apologize to my German friends, but you can perhaps guess the inappropriate thoughts my subconscious mind suggested to me.

The more I think about it, the more nonsensical it is. I mean, the Lamplighter is clearly French. He's just been translated into German. He's presented as a tragically lovable figure. There's no imputation whatsoever, the whole thing is in my imagination and I know it is. But all the same, my mind stubbornly insists on reading the book its own way.

Oh well. At least it's done my German some good. And after a while, I assume this kind of thing will stop happening... ...more

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Jul 01, 2021 Manny rated it really liked it · (Review from the author) · review of another edition

Shelves: children, french, fun-with-lara, linguistics-and-philosophy, older-men-younger-women, transcendent-experiences, translation-is-impossible, science-fiction, australia

We've been using LARA to create multimedia versions of Le petit prince. We started with the original French edition; we've now completed an English edition. There's integrated audio, and if you hover over a pencil icon you can see the original French text for the preceding sentence.

I didn't much like the publicly available English translation, which seemed stiff and dated, so I thought I'd take a shot at producing a new translation myself. Christèle Maizonniaux, a native French speaker and lectu We've been using LARA to create multimedia versions of Le petit prince. We started with the original French edition; we've now completed an English edition. There's integrated audio, and if you hover over a pencil icon you can see the original French text for the preceding sentence.

I didn't much like the publicly available English translation, which seemed stiff and dated, so I thought I'd take a shot at producing a new translation myself. Christèle Maizonniaux, a native French speaker and lecturer in French at Flinders University, assisted. We had some interesting discussions! The two words we found hardest to translate were bonhomme and sérieux. The first is a part of a term of affection: the narrator several times calls the little prince petit bonhomme, which doesn't really correspond to anything in English. The old translation says "my dear little man" but in 2021 this comes across as ridiculous, you can't say that. In the end, with some misgivings, we agreed on "kid". This isn't quite right either, but we can't find anything better.

Sérieux, an important word in the story, is even harder. The obvious choice is of course "serious", and it's not wrong. But in chapter 7, when the narrator is trying to unscrew a bolt and so upsets the little prince by ignoring his questions about the war of the sheep and the flowers, his excuse is Je m'occupe, moi, des choses sérieuses! A literal translation is "I am busy with serious things", but that feels clunky. What you would naturally say is "I'm doing something important". In the end, we decided that in most cases we would translate sérieux as "important"; so the businessman, to whom the little prince bitterly compares the narrator, also says he's doing something important. It was very interesting to think so much about what these words mean.

The story has been charmingly read by Avril, a 15-year-old Australian girl. She makes some mistakes but really gets into the story; I love the voices she uses for the six crazy adults the little prince meets on asteroids 325, 326, 327, 328, 329 and 330. For purposes of comparison, we also created a version read by a text-to-speech engine. This is more accurate than Avril, but to me it lacks soul and comes across as cold and unfeeling. ...more

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Oct 05, 2019 Manny marked it as to-read · review of another edition

Shelves: translation-is-impossible, life-is-le-petit-prince

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[Update, Dec 25 2019]
IHaveIt

...more

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Feb 28, 2015 Matt rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

It is only with the heart that one can read rightly

I read this book way back when, and I don't remember every bit of it.
But from what I remember – the rose, the fox, some quotes – I can only give it the highest possible rating.

I read the translation made by Grete and Josef Leitgeb, the only German translation available until a few days ago. The rights to this book have expired in 2015, and at least three German publishers will publish new translations plus there will be several audio-books avail ...more

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