The Morgan opened its new exhibit on The Little Prince today (Fri Jan 24 2014), designed to show how the famous little book (possibly a world leader in copies sold, since the number of about 70 million for which copyright was paid expands by about 30 million when pirated copies are added) was concocted by its author, featuring both edited drafts and initial sketches for the illustrations of the charming fairy tale.

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ONE OF THE 20TH CENTURY’S MOST BELOVED BOOKS— SAINT-EXUPÉRY’S THE LITTLE PRINCE—IS THE SUBJECT OF A MAJOR EXHIBITION AT THE MORGAN
SHOW INCLUDES THE ORIGINAL WORKING MANUSCRIPT AND WATERCOLORS, AS WELL AS LETTERS AND PHOTOGRAPHS, EXPLORING THE CREATION OF A TRUE LITERARY LANDMARK 70 YEARS AGO IN NEW YORK
The Little Prince: A New York Story
January 24–April 27, 2014
**Press Preview: Thursday, January 23, 2014, 10–11:30 a.m.**
RSVP: media@themorgan.org; (212) 590-0393
New York, NY, December 3, 2013—Since its publication seventy years ago, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince has captivated millions of readers throughout the world. Remarkably, this French tale of an interstellar traveler who comes to Earth in search of friendship and understanding was written and first published in New York City, during the two years the author spent there at the height of the Second World War. The Little Prince: A New York Story, a major exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum, will feature Saint-Exupéry’s original watercolors and heavily-revised working manuscript. Focusing on the story’s American origins, it is the first exhibition to explore in depth the creative decisions Saint-Exupéry made as he crafted what would become one of the best-selling books of all time—now translated into more than two hundred fifty languages. The Little Prince: A New York Story will be on view from January 24 through April 27, 2014.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
The Little Prince
New York: Reynal & Hitchcock, 1943
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York
Photography by Graham S. Haber, 2013
The heart of the exhibition is the display of the author’s working manuscript and drawings, which were acquired by the Morgan in 1968. Also on view will be rare printed editions from the Morgan’s collection as well as personal letters, photographs, and artifacts on loan from the Saint-Exupéry estate, private collections, and museums and libraries in France and the United States.
“The Little Prince has had a profound impact on generations of children and adults alike,” said William M. Griswold, Director of the Morgan. “This exhibition allows us to step back to the moment of creation and witness Saint-Exupéry at work right here in New York. One discovers the author-aviator struggling with the enormity of events impacting his native France and the world at large, while finding the focus to complete a tale as magical today as it was seventy years ago.”
The New York story
And I saw there before me an extraordinary little fellow who looked at me very seriously. . . . I said to him, “What are you doing here?”
– draft of The Little Prince
Like many of his compatriots, Saint-Exupéry came to the United States after France fell to Germany in 1940. During his two years in New York, Saint-Exupéry lived on Central Park South and later on Beekman Place, and he and his wife, Consuelo, rented a summer house on the north shore of Long Island. He worked on The Little Prince at various spots around the city, including the Park Avenue apartment of his friend Silvia Hamilton (later Reinhardt), using her black poodle as a model for the sheep and a mop top doll for the title character. On view in the exhibition will be a manuscript page in which Saint-Exupéry made explicit mention of Manhattan, Long Island, and even Rockefeller Center—references that he ultimately deleted from the story. Even the paper Saint-Exupéry used to draft his text reveals that The Little Prince was literally made in America—the watermark, which is visible when the sheets are held up to the light, reads Fidelity Onion Skin. Made in U.S.A.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawing for The Little Prince
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York
© Estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Photography by Graham S. Haber, 2013
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Saint-Exupéry’s time in America was fraught with personal anxiety, physical ailments, and, above all, the weight of war. After the Allied invasion of North Africa, he was able to rejoin his squadron, leaving New York just as The Little Prince was rolling off the presses in April 1943. As he prepared to leave the city, Saint-Exupéry appeared at Silvia Hamilton’s door wearing an ill-fitting military uniform. “I’d like to give you something splendid,” he said, “but this is all I have.” He tossed a rumpled paper bag on her entryway table. Inside were the manuscript and drawings for The Little Prince. The Morgan Library & Museum acquired them from her in 1968.
Because Saint-Exupéry left the city hastily to return to war, the author inscribed only a handful of copies of The Little Prince to friends. Exhibited for the first time will be the book he gave to Hamilton’s twelve-year-old son, one of the first young people to hear the story, open to the charming inscription: “For Stephen, to whom I have already spoken about the The Little Prince, and who perhaps will be his friend.” It is the only copy that Saint-Exupéry is known to have presented to a child.
Saint-Exupéry did not live to see his work appear in his native France, where it was published only after the war; he died while piloting a lone reconnaissance flight in 1944, just weeks before the liberation of Paris. The exhibition includes an extraordinarily moving artifact—the silver identity bracelet that Saint-Exupéry was wearing when his plane went down in 1944. Recovered near Marseille in 1998 after it was snagged in a fisherman’s net, it is inscribed with Saint-Exupéry’s name and the address of the American publisher of The Little Prince: Reynal & Hitchcock, 386 Fourth (i.e., Park) Avenue, N.Y.C., U.S.A. The bracelet is on loan from the estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. It has never before been exhibited in the United States.
Along with drawings and letters sent to New York friends, the exhibition includes works that illustrate the profound impact The Little Prince had on American readers. On view will be the manuscript diary of fellow author-aviator Anne Morrow Lindbergh, who felt the work conveyed a sense of “personal sadness – eternal sadness – eternal hunger – eternal searching,” as well as a letter from an Illinois schoolteacher who thanked Saint-Exupéry for providing a thought-provoking story at “a time when we need help in thinking more deeply.” The
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawing for The Little Prince
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York
© Estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Photography by Graham S. Haber, 2013
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book even kept Orson Welles up all night reading; he purchased the screen rights the following day, though the film never came to fruition. His annotated screenplay will be displayed.
The original manuscript
If it’s all the same to you I will begin this story like a fairy tale. . . . “Once upon a time there was a little prince. . . .”
– draft of The Little Prince
The Morgan’s 140-page manuscript is the only surviving handwritten draft of The Little Prince (aside from two pages that were sold at auction in 2012) and therefore the most important record of Saint-Exupéry’s creative decisions as he crafted his novel. The exhibition will feature twenty-five manuscript pages—only a handful of which have ever been on public display. A gallery guide will provide complete transcriptions and English translations of the heavily-revised French text on display.
Replete with crossed-out words and multiple versions of nearly every chapter, the manuscript even bears cigarette burns or coffee stains that reflect the author’s working habits. He often wrote late into the night and thought nothing of calling friends at two o’clock in the morning to read a few pages aloud and gauge their reaction. After completing an early version, Saint-Exupéry may have used his Dictaphone (purchased in New York at the extravagant price of $683) to revise orally before entrusting the work to a typist and, ultimately, the publisher.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Manuscript of The Little Prince
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York
© Estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Photography by Graham S. Haber, 2013
The pages on view include familiar passages in their earliest, rawest form, from the story’s opening, in which the pilot-narrator first meets the little prince, to the title character’s unforgettable encounter with the wise fox who begs to be tamed. Visitors will also see an early rendering of the story’s most famous line—“l’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux” (what is essential is invisible to the eye)—a phrase so key to the narrative that Saint-Exupéry went through some fifteen versions before settling on the final wording.
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Along with these familiar passages, visitors may examine drafts that Saint-Exupéry discarded altogether, such as an account of the little prince’s vegetarian diet—he tended his own garden, growing radishes, tomatoes, beans, and potatoes (but no fruit—the trees were too invasive for his tiny planet). Saint-Exupéry also tossed out entire episodes that he had written about the little prince’s time on earth, including an encounter with a shopkeeper who handed him a marketing textbook (“it’s full of slogans that are easy to remember”) and an inventor whose contraption could satisfy any desire at the touch of a button—even producing a lit cigarette and placing it between one’s lips.
Finally, a three-page draft of the story’s poignant epilogue, never before exhibited, hints at the author’s agony as he worked on the story while the world was at war and his own country occupied by the Nazis. “On one star someone has lost a friend, on another someone is ill, on another someone is at war,” the narrator laments in this deleted passage. As for the little prince, “he sees all that. . . . For him, the night is hopeless. And for me, his friend, the night is also hopeless.”
The drawings
I’ve never told the grown-ups that I’m not from their world. I’ve hidden the fact that I’ve always been five or six years old at heart. And therefore I have hidden my drawings from them. But I love to show them to my friends. These drawings are my memories.
– draft of The Little Prince
The Little Prince begins and ends with drawings: the first page features an image of a boa constrictor that sparked the narrator’s imagination as a child; the last shows what became, for the narrator, “the loveliest and saddest landscape in the world” after the little prince bid him farewell in the Sahara.
The Morgan’s entire collection of forty-three of the earliest versions of drawings for the book—most in watercolor but a few penned on pages of the manuscript—will be on view. Presented alongside these early drawings will be images from the first edition, allowing comparisons between the two versions. In addition, a newly discovered drawing, never
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Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawing for The Little Prince
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York
© Estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Photography by Graham S. Haber, 2013
before published or publicly exhibited, will be shown. The drawing is from the collection of Mark Reinhardt, the grandson of Silvia Hamilton, to whom Saint-Exupéry entrusted his manuscript and drawings before leaving New York. It depicts one of the most evocative scenes from the book: the little prince watching sunsets on his tiny planet. The Morgan holds two drawings of the same scene, and viewers will be able to see and compare the three versions.
Some of the drawings depict familiar images from the book: the little prince in the desert, the king alone on his planet, the little prince lying beside a garden after discovering that his rose is not unique in the universe. Others were excluded from the published book, such as a view of the pilot asleep on the sand after his plane has crashed a thousand miles from any living soul. One of the most haunting images—an unpublished drawing of the little prince wearing his yellow scarf and floating above Earth—was clearly wadded up into a ball only to be rescued from the garbage can, flattened and retained.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawing for The Little Prince
The Morgan Library & Museum, New York
© Estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Photography by Graham S. Haber, 2013
Also on display will be a deleted passage that underscores the centrality of the drawings to The Little Prince. The narrator, discouraged from an artistic career by grown-ups who thought he should focus instead on math and geography, explains: “I’ve never told the grown-ups that I’m not from their world. I’ve hidden the fact that I’ve always been five or six years old at heart. And therefore I have hidden my drawings from them. But I love to show them to my friends. These drawings are my memories.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944) was a French aviator who came of age in the early, heady days of commercial flight. He piloted the mails in North Africa and South America and later served as a reconnaissance pilot with the French Air Force during the Second World War. He wrote of his experiences in a series of novels and essays that turned him into a best-selling author and celebrity both at home and abroad. Saint-Exupéry enjoyed making sketches from the time he was a boy and spent a few unproductive months in architecture school when he was twenty, but had no formal training as an artist and had never illustrated a book before embarking on The Little Prince.
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Photojournalist John Phillips (1914–1996), known for his contributions to Life, captured Major Saint-Exupéry with his comrades on the island of Sardinia just weeks before his final mission in 1944. A selection of Phillips’s striking photographs will be shown.
Children’s literature at the Morgan
John Phillips (1914–1996) Antoine de Saint-Exupéry in Alghero, Sardinia, May 1944 Silver gelatin print Collection of Andrea Cairone, New York © John and Annamaria Phillips Foundation
The drawings and manuscripts for The Little Prince are part of the Morgan’s rich collection of children’s literature, which includes the earliest written record of the Mother Goose tales (a 1695 illustrated manuscript of Charles Perrault’s Contes de Ma Mere l’Oye), illustrated letters of Beatrix Potter, and the drafts and drawings for Jean de Brunhoff’s Histoire de Babar (1931).
Several important precursors to The Little Prince will be on view immediately outside the exhibition gallery. They include a luxe 1909 French illustrated book that features Hans Christian Andersen’s tale “The Little Mermaid,” which inspired Saint-Exupéry, and an early edition of Mary Poppins, whose author, P. L. Travers, was one of the first (and most astute) reviewers of The Little Prince. She addressed the persistent question of whether the book is for children or adults, predicting that the multi-layered story would “shine upon children with a sidewise gleam. It will strike them in some place that is not the mind and glow there until the time comes for them to comprehend it.”
Visiting with families
A bilingual (English/French) gallery guide will be available for families, and Little Prince coloring sheets for younger visitors will be on hand for those dining in the Morgan Café. The exhibition installation will include a reading area with colorful carpets and stools where visitors may sit together and page through copies of The Little Prince in both English and French. On April 27, 2014, the Morgan will present its Spring Family Fair with Little Prince-themed activities including 7
theater, film, costume play, and collaborative mural-painting that bring the book to life for young visitors.
Seventieth-anniversary publications
The exhibition coincides with the release of a full facsimile edition of the Morgan manuscript by Éditions Gallimard, entitled Le Manuscrit du Petit Prince d’Antoine de Saint-Exupéry: Fac-similé et Transcription, edited by Alban Cerisier et Delphine Lacroix. A variety of new seventieth-anniversary editions of The Little Prince have also been published in English by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and in French by Gallimard.
PUBLIC PROGRAMS
Film
Only Angels Have Wings
Friday, February 7, 7 pm
(1939, 121 minutes); Director: Howard Hawkes
This classic film about mail carriers and their dangerous flights over the Andes strongly resembles Saint-Exupéry’s book Flight to Arras. Featuring Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, and Rita Hayworth.
Free with museum admission. Tickets are available at the Admission Desk on the day of the screening.
Family Program
Imagine Your Planet: What Planet Do You Come From?
Saturday, February 8, 2-4 pm
Drawing inspiration from Saint-Exupéry’s watercolors and sketches, families will imagine traveling from planet to planet with the little prince. Children will then envision their very own planet and build it with an array of materials such as clay, wire, beads, fabric, yarn, and tissue.
Tickets: $8, $6 for Members, $2 for children
http://www.themorgan.org/programs; 212-685-0008 x560
Gallery Talk
Friday, February 21, 6:30 pm
Exhibition curator Christine Nelson will lead this informal tour of The Little Prince: A New York Story.
Free with museum admission
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Talk
The Little Prince and the Big War
Tuesday, February 25, 6:30 pm
Adam Gopnik, New Yorker essayist and author of The Steps Across The Water, The King In The Window, and Paris to the Moon—and who is currently adapting The Little Prince for the National Ballet of Canada—will talk about Antoine de Saint-Exupéry and the Second World War, and how his haunting children’s masterpiece can be seen as an idiosyncratic piece of war literature. The exhibition will be open at 5:30 pm for program attendees.
Tickets: $15; $10 for Members; Free for students with valid ID, subject to availability.
http://www.themorgan.org/programs; 212-685-0008 x560
Gallery Talk
Saturday, March 1, 3 pm
Marie Trope-Podell, the Morgan’s Manager of Gallery Programs, will lead this French language tour of The Little Prince: A New York Story.
Free with museum admission
Talk
Saint-Exupéry in New York: A Conversation with Stacy Schiff
Tuesday, March 11, 6:30 pm
Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Stacy Schiff, author of Saint-Exupéry, Véra (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov), A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America, and Cleopatra: A Life, talks with Christine Nelson, Drue Heinz Curator of Literary and Historical Manuscripts, about Saint-Exupéry’s miserable, insomniacal, brilliantly productive New York years. The exhibition will be open at 5:30 pm for program attendees.
Tickets: $15; $10 for Members; Free for students with valid ID, subject to availability.
http://www.themorgan.org/programs; 212-685-0008 x560
Film
The Little Prince
Friday, March 14, 7 pm
(1974, 88 minutes); Director: Stanley Donen
Lerner and Loewe’s adaptation of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s beloved tale of a stranded pilot who befriends a “little” prince is set to music, starring Gene Wilder as the Fox and Bob Fosse as the Snake.
Free with museum admission. Tickets are available at the Admission Desk on the day of the screening.
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Concert
Michaël Lévinas, piano
Catherine Trottman, mezzo-soprano
Friday, April 11, 7:30 pm
Composer and pianist Michaël Lévinas with mezzo-soprano Catherine Trottman present a program of French music, including an excerpt from a newly-commissioned opera, The Little Prince, based on Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s book, premiering at Opera de Lausanne in fall 2014. The exhibition will be open at 6:30 for program attendees.
Debussy, First book of Preludes
Ravel, Sheherazade
Poulenc, Banalités
Messiaen, “Pourquoi,” “Le sourire”
Levinas, “La rose chante” (extract from the opera Le Petit Prince, “The Rose”)
Tickets: $35; $25 for Members
http://www.themorgan.org/programs; 212-685-0008 x560
Talk
The Pilot and the Little Prince: A Conversation with Peter Sís
Tuesday, April 22, 6:30 pm
Internationally acclaimed illustrator, filmmaker, and author of over twenty books, Peter Sís talks about his forthcoming book The Pilot and the Little Prince: The Life of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry with Christine Nelson, Drue Heinz Curator of Literary and Historical Manuscripts. The exhibition will be open at 5:30 pm for program attendees.
Tickets: $15; $10 for Members; Free for students with valid ID, subject to availability.
http://www.themorgan.org/programs; 212-685-0008 x560
Family Program
Spring Family Fair
Sunday, April 27, 2-5 pm
This year’s Spring Family Fair takes its inspiration from The Little Prince. Families will watch an animated short film (The Little Prince/Will Vinton), compose a large mural made of planets, and try on fun costumes. The Ben Jam troupe will bring to life the little prince, the fox, and the rose and invite families to follow the mysterious little boy in his magical journey through outer space and planet Earth. Appropriate for ages 6–12.
Tickets: $8, $6 for Members, $2 for children
http://www.themorgan.org/programs; 212-685-0008 x560
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ORGANIZATION AND SPONSORSHIP
The exhibition is organized by Christine Nelson, the Morgan’s Drue Heinz Curator of Literary and Historical Manuscripts.
Lead funding for this exhibition is provided by Barbara and James Runde and by The Florence Gould Foundation.
Generous support is also provided by Air France, Liz and Rod Berens, and the Caroline Macomber Fund, with additional assistance from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
The programs of The Morgan Library & Museum are made possible with public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.
The Morgan Library & Museum
The Morgan Library & Museum began as the private library of financier Pierpont Morgan, one of the preeminent collectors and cultural benefactors in the United States. Today, more than a century after its founding in 1906, the Morgan serves as a museum, independent research library, musical venue, architectural landmark, and historic site. In October 2010, the Morgan completed the first-ever restoration of its original McKim building, Pierpont Morgan’s private library, and the core of the institution. In tandem with the 2006 expansion project by architect Renzo Piano, the Morgan now provides visitors unprecedented access to its world-renowned collections of drawings, literary and historical manuscripts, musical scores, medieval and Renaissance manuscripts, printed books, and ancient Near Eastern seals and tablets.
General Information
The Morgan Library & Museum
225 Madison Avenue, at 36th Street, New York, NY 10016-3405
212.685.0008
http://www.themorgan.org
Just a short walk from Grand Central and Penn Station
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Hours
Tuesday–Thursday, 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.; extended Friday hours, 10:30 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Sunday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.; closed Mondays, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day, and New Year’s Day. The Morgan closes at 4 p.m. on Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve.
Admission
$18 for adults; $12 for students, seniors (65 and over), and children (under 16); free to Members and children 12 and under accompanied by an adult. Admission is free on Fridays from 7 to 9 p.m. Admission is not required to visit the Morgan Shop, Café, or Dining Room
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How does a story begin? French author and aviator Antoine
de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944) came to New York in 1940, a few
months after Germany invaded France. In 1942, at the height of
the Second World War, he took up a stack of onionskin paper
and a set of watercolors and began to craft a tale about an
interstellar traveler in search of friendship and understanding.
The working manuscript and drawings for his most enduring
work, The Little Prince—now in the Morgan’s collection—reveal
the stops and starts, decisions and excisions he made along the
way. This exhibition takes us back to the American origins of
the French tale that has become one of the world’s favorite books.
The New York firm Reynal & Hitchcock published the
first editions of The Little Prince—in both English and French—
in April 1943, just as the author was about to return to war as
a reconnaissance pilot. Before he left the city, he entrusted the
preliminary drafts to his friend Silvia Hamilton, from whom
the Morgan acquired them in 1968. In 1944, weeks before the
liberation of Paris, Saint-Exupéry lost his life on an Allied
mission. The Little Prince would not appear in his native France
until after the war.
Lead funding for this exhibition is provided by Barbara and James Runde
and by The Florence Gould Foundation.
Generous support is also provided by Air France, Liz and Rod Berens,
and the Caroline Macomber Fund.

SAINT-EXUPÉRY’S NEW YORK
If you constructed a huge building 50 stories tall (just like Rockefeller Center)
that covered Manhattan, and if all of mankind stood inside, you could house
the whole world in Manhattan!

Saint-Exupéry rented a summer house in 1942 to escape the Manhattan
heat and work on The Little Prince. His wife, Consuelo, chose this
Victorian mansion on the north shore of Long Island. “I wanted a hut
and it’s the Palace of Versailles,” he grumbled. Despite a steady stream
of guests—at least one of whom was called upon to pose as the little
prince—Saint-Exupéry had a productive stay.
The studio of Saint-Exupéry’s old friend Bernard Lamotte, now the site
of the restaurant La Grenouille, was a favorite wartime haunt of artists,
actors, and expatriates. Guests would gather around the big wooden
table and inscribe their names on the surface. Saint-Exupéry, who often
stationed himself there amid piles of manuscript drafts, added a carving
of a little character he liked to sketch.
Saint-Exupéry spent many hours writing at the Upper East Side
apartment of his friend Silvia Hamilton, with her black poodle as a
model for the sheep and a mop-top doll standing in for the title character.
As he prepared to leave the city, Saint-Exupéry appeared at Silvia’s door,
proudly wearing an ill-fitting military uniform. “I’d like to give you
something splendid,” he said, “but this is all I have.” He tossed a
rumpled paper bag on her entryway table. Inside were the manuscript
and drawings for The Little Prince.

When Saint-Exupéry’s ship docked in New York on the last day of 1940, he was
already a literary celebrity. Shortly after his arrival, at an enormous banquet in
Times Square, he was awarded the 1939 National Book Award for Wind, Sand and
Stars, a best-selling memoir of his experience as an aviator. Friends found him an
apartment on Central Park South, and he later moved to a townhouse on Beekman
Place. He wrote, drew, and revised The Little Prince at various spots around the
city and on Long Island.
Saint-Exupéry never learned to speak English, though he reluctantly took
a few lessons with a private tutor. He formed close relationships and spent time
with expatriate friends, but his two years here were fraught with personal anxiety,
physical ailments, and, above all, the weight of war. He left New York in April 1943
to rejoin his reconnaissance unit in North Africa just as the first edition of
The Little Prince hit the shelves of local bookstores.
Saint-Exupéry rented a summer house in 1942 to escape the Manhattan
heat and work on The Little Prince. His wife, Consuelo, chose this
Victorian mansion on the north shore of Long Island. “I wanted a hut
and it’s the Palace of Versailles,” he grumbled. Despite a steady stream
of guests—at least one of whom was called upon to pose as the little
prince—Saint-Exupéry had a productive stay.
The studio of Saint-Exupéry’s old friend Bernard Lamotte, now the site
of the restaurant La Grenouille, was a favorite wartime haunt of artists,
actors, and expatriates. Guests would gather around the big wooden
table and inscribe their names on the surface. Saint-Exupéry, who often
stationed himself there amid piles of manuscript drafts, added a carving
of a little character he liked to sketch.
Saint-Exupéry spent many hours writing at the Upper East Side
apartment of his friend Silvia Hamilton, with her black poodle as a
model for the sheep and a mop-top doll standing in for the title character.
As he prepared to leave the city, Saint-Exupéry appeared at Silvia’s door,
proudly wearing an ill-fitting military uniform. “I’d like to give you
something splendid,” he said, “but this is all I have.” He tossed a
rumpled paper bag on her entryway table. Inside were the manuscript
and drawings for The Little Prince.
When Saint-Exupéry’s ship docked in New York on the last day of 1940, he was
already a literary celebrity. Shortly after his arrival, at an enormous banquet in
Times Square, he was awarded the 1939 National Book Award for Wind, Sand and
Stars, a best-selling memoir of his experience as an aviator. Friends found him an
apartment on Central Park South, and he later moved to a townhouse on Beekman
Place. He wrote, drew, and revised The Little Prince at various spots around the
city and on Long Island.
Saint-Exupéry never learned to speak English, though he reluctantly took
a few lessons with a private tutor. He formed close relationships and spent time
with expatriate friends, but his two years here were fraught with personal anxiety,
physical ailments, and, above all, the weight of war. He left New York in April 1943
to rejoin his reconnaissance unit in North Africa just as the first edition of
The Little Prince hit the shelves of local bookstores.
Saint-Exupéry rented a summer house in 1942 to escape the Manhattan
heat and work on The Little Prince. His wife, Consuelo, chose this
Victorian mansion on the north shore of Long Island. “I wanted a hut
and it’s the Palace of Versailles,” he grumbled. Despite a steady stream
of guests—at least one of whom was called upon to pose as the little
prince—Saint-Exupéry had a productive stay.
The studio of Saint-Exupéry’s old friend Bernard Lamotte, now the site
of the restaurant La Grenouille, was a favorite wartime haunt of artists,
actors, and expatriates. Guests would gather around the big wooden
table and inscribe their names on the surface. Saint-Exupéry, who often
stationed himself there amid piles of manuscript drafts, added a carving
of a little character he liked to sketch.
Saint-Exupéry spent many hours writing at the Upper East Side
apartment of his friend Silvia Hamilton, with her black poodle as a
model for the sheep and a mop-top doll standing in for the title character.
As he prepared to leave the city, Saint-Exupéry appeared at Silvia’s door,
proudly wearing an ill-fitting military uniform. “I’d like to give you
something splendid,” he said, “but this is all I have.” He tossed a
rumpled paper bag on her entryway table. Inside were the manuscript
and drawings for The Little Prince.

A WORLD AT WAR
This drawing—a haunting precursor to The Little
Prince—incorporates many of the book’s key
motifs: the smattering of stars, a rose and a sheep,
and, of course, a little figure in space. In 1940, when
he wrote and illustrated this letter, Saint-Exupéry
was serving as a reconnaissance pilot in northern
France, flying the dangerous missions he would
memorialize in his book Flight to Arras. He labeled
the cloud Bloch 174, the type of aircraft he flew,
and sketched a Messerschmidt Bf 109, a German
fighter plane, in the form of a horned devil, in the
upper right corner. Saint-Exupéry sent the letter
to his friend Léon Werth, the Jewish writer to
whom he would later dedicate The Little Prince.
He signed with his nickname, Tonio.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Letter to Léon Werth, Paris, April 1940
Fonds Léon Werth, Médiathèque Albert-Camus,
Issoudun, France
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawing given to Elizabeth Reynal,
New York, ca. 1942
Graphite
Gift of Elizabeth Young Darbee, 1991
A NEW YORK FRIENDSHIP
Saint-Exupéry gave this drawing to his friend
Elizabeth Reynal, a French-speaking New Yorker
and godmother to the little prince: it was she who
suggested that the author turn his favorite doodle
into the protagonist of a children’s book. Reynal
and another friend, Peggy Hitchcock, also helped
ease Saint-Exupéry’s way when he arrived in New
York on the last day of 1940. Together they found
him an apartment on Central Park South, filled the
refrigerator and stocked the bar, and organized a
cozy welcome party. Their husbands were partners
in the firm Reynal & Hitchcock, which would
publish the first editions of The Little Prince in 1943.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawing given to Elizabeth Reynal,
New York, ca. 1942
Graphite
Gift of Elizabeth Young Darbee, 1991
WALKING THE FOX
In this drawing, another gift to Elizabeth Reynal,
the little prince walks a fennec—a long-eared desert
fox that Saint-Exupéry encountered during his
time in North Africa. The drawing relates closely
to a deleted passage in the draft manuscript of
The Little Prince. When the fox meets the little prince,
he explains that he can stroll about freely only on
Thursdays, when the hunters are off dancing with
the local girls. The little prince offers to take him
for a walk and keep him safe from the men. “I’ll tell
them you’re my dog,” he suggests.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawing given to Eileen Prince Burns,
New York, 1942
Colored pencil
Gift of Eileen Prince Burns, 1990
BONHOMME WITH ROSE
This sketch is typical of Saint-Exupéry’s many spirited
renderings of a balding (perhaps self-referential)
relative of the little prince. He gave it to Eileen
Prince Burns, who was preparing a radio dramatization
of his book Flight to Arras for broadcast on
NBC’s Author’s Playhouse. The program aired in
October 1942, just as Saint-Exupéry was completing
the manuscript of The Little Prince. Like many who
came into contact with the author during his time
in New York, Burns never forgot him: “He was
magnetic: his round head, his pointed nose, winged
eyebrows. Puck: an Ariel, tethered to the human
condition, craving the sky.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Illustrated letters to Hedda Sterne,
New York, 1942
Hedda Sterne papers, Archives of American Art,
Smithsonian Institution
FOR A FELLOW EXPATRIATE ARTIST
During his time in New York, Saint-Exupéry found
great solace in his friendship with Hedda Sterne,
a Romanian-born artist and fellow émigré. Some
of his extraordinary letters to her—written on the
same paper he used to compose The Little Prince—
are adorned with sketches of figures on flowery
hillsides; others feature more explicit renderings
of the title character. When he left the city, he gave
Sterne the manuscript of Letter to a Hostage, his
agonized essay about the Nazi occupation of
France, written in the form of a letter to his dear
friend Léon Werth, to whom he also dedicated
The Little Prince.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (1900–1944)
Drawings enclosed in letters to an unidentified
woman, Algiers, 1943
Pen and ink and watercolor
Collection privée / Musée des Lettres et Manuscrits, Paris
AUTHOR AND ALTER EGO
Shortly after Saint-Exupéry had left New York to
return to war, he met a young Red Cross officer
and ambulance driver during a train trip in North
Africa. He sent her a series of extravagantly illustrated
letters. In them, Saint-Exupéry and the little
prince have become one and the same. In one of
the drawings shown here, the little prince voices
the author’s own complaint: C’est triste . . . on ne
pense pas à me telephoner (It’s sad . . . it doesn’t occur
to you to call me). In the other, he waits dejectedly
beside a roadside milestone.
THE LITTLE PRINCE AT HOME
He planted a vegetable garden in order to feed himself.
He had radish, tomato, potato, and bean seeds.
—deleted passage
Saint-Exupéry eventually discarded almost every
element of this draft page, which features images
of an early version of the little prince—when he
had just a few strands of hair. As he sweeps up his
planet, clouds of dust turn into a shower of shooting
stars. Dirty from his chores, he then takes a bath
in the sea. The accompanying text describes his
diet: vegetables (but no fruit) grown from seed in
a garden that did not figure in the published story.
“But within his seed packets were some baobab
seeds,” reads the draft, “because nothing’s perfect.”
6
ALONE IN THE DESERT
The first night, then, I went to sleep on the sand, a thousand
miles away from any living soul.
—Chapter II
The Little Prince is narrated by an unnamed pilot
who is forced to spend the night under the stars
after his plane crashes in the Sahara. Saint-Exupéry
himself had suffered similar predicaments more
than once: in Mauritania in 1927 (the same year
Lindbergh flew across the Atlantic) and again in 1935
in the Libyan Desert. Though he completed more
than one version of this drawing, Saint-Exupéry did
not include it—or indeed any image of the pilot or
his wreckage—in the finished book. “I won’t draw
my airplane,” the narrator explains. “That would be
much too complicated for me.”
THE PRINCE AND THE PILOT
He looked at me, hammer in hand, my fingers black with
engine grease. . . .
—Chapter VII
When the pilot awakens from a night under the
stars, he is surprised to see an extraordinary little
person—an alien traveler who demands a drawing
and thus reawakens his youthful imagination.
In these two watercolors, Saint-Exupéry depicted
an encounter between the two: a frustrated little
prince demanding to be heard and the preoccupied
pilot intent on repairing his damaged plane. In the
end, Saint-Exupéry chose not to depict the pilot,
not even his raised fist.
A SERIOUS MAN
They sent reporters who asked my opinion about science,
about religion, about war, about love, about choosing
neckties. I know nothing about neckties, but I never dared
admit it.
—deleted passage
The author and the narrator of The Little Prince
had a great deal in common—both were aviators
who had crashed in the desert, both liked to
draw but had not made a career of it, and both
experienced profound loneliness and melancholy.
This early draft passage includes additional details
(excluded from the published story) that link the
two: the narrator transported airmail, lived in
South America and Africa, and wrote books, just
like Saint-Exupéry. The sketch may depict the
narrator masquerading as “a serious man” or one
of the unimaginative grown-ups to whom he
shows his childhood drawings.
7
A NEW YORK MEGAMEETING
There are two billion inhabitants on this planet. If you got
them all together for an enormous meeting, . . . all of mankind
would fit on Long Island. (Of course it would be very
complicated to feed them.)
—draft of Chapter XVII
Saint-Exupéry mentioned New York, Manhattan, or
Long Island six times in his draft of The Little Prince
but ended up deleting all references to the story’s
birthplace. Here the narrator declares that humans
don’t take up as much space as we think we do—
in fact, he argues, we could all get together for a
meeting on Long Island. As he revised the story for
publication, Saint-Exupéry changed Long Island to
Pacific islet. In the blurb in the left-hand margin, he
considered still another location for the massive
gathering: a building as tall as 30 Rockefeller Center
that covered all Manhattan. If we all squeezed in,
we just might fit.
8
THE IMPORTANCE OF HOUSEKEEPING
There are planets that are threatened by snakes, some by
locusts, others by volcanoes. The little prince’s planet was
threatened by baobabs.
—draft of Chapter V
The little prince is highly attentive to planetary
maintenance—he digs up the sprouts of invasive
baobab trees and cleans out his three tiny volcanoes.
(In the draft manuscript, he uses one of them to
heat up his morning hot chocolate, an endearing
detail that Saint-Exupéry chose to delete, though
one of the published illustrations does feature a
makeshift hot plate.) In these drawings Saint-Exupéry
tried to capture the posture of his protagonist
wielding one of his tools. He also made a series
of brushstrokes that show the prevailing palette of
this watercolor series.
A “SVELTE” BOA
The boa constrictor swallows its prey whole without chewing
it. And it goes to sleep for six months. . . . After six months
the boa constrictor becomes svelte again.
—draft of Chapter I
On this page Saint-Exupéry sketched early versions
of several of the key illustrations that would
appear in the opening chapters of The Little Prince:
a baobab tree overtaking a lazy man’s planet, a boa
constrictor from the outside, and a boa from the
inside (to allow literal-minded adults to view the
creature’s last meal—a whole elephant). The long
skinny form at the upper right is a “svelte” boa, as
it would appear after digestion. According to the
draft manuscript, grown-ups would always mistake
this shape for a necktie. The svelte boa did not
make an appearance in the published book.
THE PROBLEM OF BAOBABS
“Your baobab looks a bit like a cabbage. But that’s all right.
It’s understandable all the same.”
—draft of chapter XXV
Saint-Exupéry worked hard to perfect his depiction
of the menacing baobabs, going through several
drafts that portray a single tree and finally settling
upon a group of three. The little prince himself
appears in these preliminary drawings, but Saint-
Exupéry later replaced him with a lazy man who
had neglected baobab weeding. In the draft manuscript,
the narrator underscores the particular
effort he put into this illustration: “In order to warn
my friends about the danger . . . I took great care
to create the most beautiful drawing of my life.”
THE ASTRONOMER
Do you know what a planet is? A planet consists of fragments
of a star that have cooled down and on which you can live.
—draft of Chapter IV
This sketch depicts the astronomer who discovered
the little prince’s home asteroid, B-612 (A- 612 or
ACB-316 in the manuscript). The manuscript identifies
him as a nearsighted Dutchman, but Saint-Exupéry
crossed out Dutch, replaced it with Turkish, and
added a fez to the character’s head. When the
astronomer presents his findings dressed in traditional
garb, the draft reads, “no one believed him because
of his outfit.” In the published illustration, the
European gawker, unable to see past national stereotypes,
was eliminated.
9
WATCHING SUNSETS
If he went out at 5 o’clock in the afternoon he would set
himself up at the 5 o’clock meridian. That would entertain
him for a little while. But that’s a monotonous game.
And he was sad.
—draft of Chapter VI
The little prince loves to watch sunsets, especially
in times of great sadness. Because his planet is so
small, he can easily view one after another simply
by shifting his chair. Here Saint-Exupéry depicted
this phenomenon graphically, labeling the meridian
lines to indicate the passage of time. But he ultimately
decided not to include the diagram in the
published book. He opted for a more melancholy
image: the little prince, his back to the reader,
watching the sun go down.
10
Above: The Morgan Library & Museum
Below: Collection of Mark Reinhardt and Molly Magavern
THE SADDEST DAY
“Were you so sad, then?” I asked, “on the day of the
forty-four sunsets?”
—Chapter VI
When the book was published in France in 1946,
three years after the first American editions, the text
indicated that the little prince had watched the sun
set quarante-trois (forty-three) times, leading many
people to believe that the American translator had
made a mistake. But the manuscript clearly reads
quarante-quatre (forty-four) on three different draft
pages. When Saint-Exupéry disappeared in 1944,
at the age of forty-four, this melancholic episode
took on added poignancy.
Left: The Morgan Library & Museum
Right: Collection of Mark Reinhardt and Molly Magavern
THE SADDEST DAY
“Were you so sad, then?” I asked, “on the day of the
forty-four sunsets?”
—Chapter VI
When the book was published in France in 1946,
three years after the first American editions, the text
indicated that the little prince had watched the sun
set quarante-trois (forty-three) times, leading many
people to believe that the American translator had
made a mistake. But the manuscript clearly reads
quarante-quatre (forty-four) on three different draft
pages. When Saint-Exupéry disappeared in 1944,
at the age of forty-four, this melancholic episode
took on added poignancy.
CHASING BUTTERFLIES
“I’ll have to put up with two or three caterpillars if I want
to get to know the butterflies.”
—Chapter IX
A military colleague once asked Saint-Exupéry
why he so often sketched a figure chasing butterflies.
He explained that he admired the character’s
“pursuit of a realistic ideal” (in contrast, perhaps,
to the often futile or fatal work of the reconnaissance
pilots of Saint-Exupéry’s squadron). Although
this figure bears no resemblance to the little prince,
the unpublished drawing clearly depicts his planet.
On the left, a pulley allows a globe to descend
over a fragile flower. (Saint-Exupéry ultimately
repurposed the pulley in the desert scene.) Three
caterpillars creep along, two on the stems of flowers
and another on the ground. But what is the
little igloo on the lower left—perhaps a cap for
the little prince’s knee-high active volcano?
THE KING
The little prince looked everywhere for a place to sit, but
the planet was completely enveloped by the magnificent
ermine robe.
—Chapter X
The first stop on the little prince’s travels is an
asteroid inhabited only by a monarch who demands
obedience, despite his utter lack of subjects. The
character is shown here in an early draft, before he
had acquired his voluminous garment. Adèle Breaux,
the young woman who gave Saint-Exupéry English
lessons during his stay on Long Island, saw several
drafts of this illustration. “His sky-blue cloak was
not right for him,” Saint-Exupéry told her, “nor his
ruddy face for his years. In this second picture his
skin color is better and I gave him a white cloak.
Kings always wear ermine.”
11
AN IMMODEST MAN
“To admire means that you acknowledge that I am the most
attractive, best-dressed, wealthiest, and most intelligent
man on the planet.”
—Chapter XI
As the little prince makes his way through the
universe, he encounters a series of grown-ups,
each perched alone upon a tiny planet. Each
exhibits a puzzling—and isolating—grown-up trait,
from egotism to materialism. On his second stop,
he meets a conceited man with a funny hat who
demands acclaim. Saint-Exupéry made several
drawings of a pompous character whose cap (or,
in a few cases, crown) could be tipped to passing
admirers—if indeed he had any!
DRINKING TO FORGET
But this time the little prince was deeply troubled. There was
something about the bondage of the drinker that he just
couldn’t understand.
—draft of Chapter XII
On his third stop, the little prince comes across a
ruddy-faced man who sits before a clutter of bottles,
some empty, some full. This character, called
“the tippler” in Katherine Woods’s 1943 translation,
explains why he drinks: in order to forget he is
ashamed (of drinking). In the draft manuscript,
Saint-Exupéry struggled with the ending of this
brief chapter. He made several attempts to describe
the little prince’s unfathomable sadness upon
encountering the drinker but crossed them all out
and settled on a simple conclusion: “Grown-ups
are certainly very, very strange.”
GROWN-UPS ARE SO BIZARRE
“I don’t get any exercise. I have no time to loaf about.
I’m very serious, I am.”
—draft of Chapter XIII
Throughout the book, the little prince and the
narrator address a fundamental question: what
constitutes true seriousness and maturity? Is it
fulfillment of duty, accumulation of belongings,
or devotion to scholarship? Where do love and
imagination fit in? These unpublished drawings
may be early versions of some of the ostensibly
serious men, the businessman and the geographer,
that the little prince encounters on his travels
before ending up on the strangest planet of them
all—Earth. Their hats, desks, and cigars are
markers of adulthood.
A COLLECTION OF CHARACTERS
I was like you—I wanted to understand everything right
away. But it was fruitless to question him. I was obliged to
piece the story together from occasional revelations.
—draft of Chapter V
Who are the characters depicted in these three
unpublished drawings? None resembles the little
prince as we know him, but there are intriguing
similarities. One figure, engaged in animated conversation,
wears a long streaming scarf, the little
prince’s signature accessory. Another hovers over
an inhabited planet, but Saint-Exupéry ultimately
determined that the little prince would not need
wings to fly—he hitches a ride instead with a
flock of wild geese (ducks in the draft manuscript).
In the third drawing, a yellow-haired character
holds a bucket, much like the one the little prince
conjures up in the desert to quench the pilot’s thirst.
AND THE SEVENTH PLANET
WAS EARTH
“Where do you suggest I go next?” he asked. “The planet
Earth,” replied the geographer. “It has a good reputation.”
—Chapter XV
When the little prince arrives at the final stop on his
interstellar journey, he is surprised not to find any
people. “I traveled around your planet for a long
time before meeting anyone,” he tells the pilot in a
passage deleted from the manuscript. Saint-Exupéry
decided to cut almost all the episodes he wrote
about the little prince’s encounters on Earth. “He
didn’t tell me much about them, probably so he
wouldn’t upset me,” the pilot explains in another
deleted passage. “I came to realize it was a very
strange journey.”
I’VE BEEN TO THE MOUNTAINTOP
“I do have two volcanoes back home, but they only come up
to my knees. I use the extinct one as a stool. Now a real
mountain—I’ve dreamt of seeing one for such a long time. . . .”
—draft of Chapter XIX
Surely from the highest peak of the world’s highest
mountain will the little prince be able to get an
accurate sense of the planet Earth and its people! But
he sees only ocean, sand, and rock. Saint-Exupéry
made several versions of an illustration depicting
the little prince surveying our puzzling planet
before going on to meet a series of men. (In one
of these drawings, the little prince appears to wear
an aviator’s cap with flaps.) In a passage deleted
from the manuscript, he tells the pilot, “I’ve been
even lonelier on this inhabited planet than I was
on my own.”
AND HE LAY DOWN AND CRIED
“Why are you sad?” asked the roses. “I had a flower,” said
the little prince. “She told me she was the only one of her kind
in the universe. And it turns out she is just a rose.”
—draft of Chapter XX
The prominent