Although this story, written by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, looks like a book for children due to the drawings and the style, in reality The little prince is classified as a philosophical tale. First, the author is criticizing through this story our modern society… don’t forget that it was written during World War Two therefore he wanted people to question themselves and their values. The main points are the following:
– the contrast between appearances and reality
– the incapacity of communicating between adults and children
– the importance of relationships among people and to take care of them
– the sense of responsibility towards others
– the loss of true values due to money and power (represented by different kind of adults: the king, the drunkard, the geographer as scientist, the businessman, the vain man and the streetlight igniter)
In The Little Prince, the adults are portrayed in a pejorative way: their lives consist of dependencies (alcohol, the need of admiration, the greed to possess etc.), of loneliness and lack of feelings. After reading this short description, you can observe that CSH’s world looks a lot like the world in this story. The two main protagonists in The Little Prince are the aviator and the Little Prince, yet they should be considered as representing the same person because the main point of this tale is to ask people to take care of their inner child. That’s why you can read in The little Prince
“All grown-ups were once children… but only few of them remember it.”
The little prince represents the child embodying all the positive aspects like innocence, creativity, imagination, purity and curiosity in opposite to the adults mentioned above, while the narrator and aviator is the adult. Meeting the prince in the desert means that the aviator is able to rediscover his inner child and rethink about his own life: True values like friendship and love become visible again hence the fox says that
“It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”
At the end of the story, The Little Prince leaves the aviator behind (officially he goes back to his planet but since a snake bit him, we can wonder if he died), yet the narrator says that he is still looking for the little prince, even asking the readers if they saw him. Besides, when the aviator looks at the stars in the sky, he always thinks of him. As you can see, the aviator doesn’t forget his “inner child”. He is an grown-up after all, yet he shouldn’t forget his inner child.
In the beginning, the aviator explains an unforgettable event. When he was 6 years old, the adults couldn’t understand his drawing hence he gave up to become an artist. From that moment, the aviator started living like a grown-up… and here we can see a parallel with CSH. It was around this age, where she was forced to give up her innocence and carefree life and become an adult at an young age. Meeting KJH is like meeting the little prince. She discovers what she has long forgotten: love, joy, carefree life aso. This also justifies why KJH has this playfulness and cheerfulness as he is still very innocent. He might be a grown-up on the surface, yet his personality reminds us of a “child”. I can not forget how some viewers sometimes reacted to his huge smiles… they were somehow bothered by these smiles. But seeing these from this perspective, KJH is the little prince, the one who will awaken CSH’s inner child. Thanks to him, CSH is able to perceive life with her heart and no longer with her eyes. JWS was too realistic and too grown-up to bring happiness into her life. On the other hand, CSH represents the adulthood because in the philosophical tale, the little prince starts changing as well: he discovers what friendship and love mean which becomes painful for him. He loses little by little his innocence as well.
He left his planet because of the rose. The flower was so vain, contradictory but vulnerable, however she ended up hurting the little prince with her words. She loves him but she is well aware that she was the reason he misunderstood her. The rose symbolizes on the one hand femininity and on the other love. The little prince only realized how unique his rose was after meeting the fox:
“It’s the time you spent on your rose that makes your rose so important.”
We could say that KJH is resembling a lot to the little prince. He spent a lot of time with his rose, took great care of her but due to her words, he ended up leaving her behind. The rose could be perceived either as CSH (she broke up with him) or his mother (who hurt him by forcing CSH to break up with him). Moreover, moving closer to CSH who is the archetype of the adult means facing reality and the world of the grown-ups. He met the queen Chairman Kim, the greedy director Choi, the jealous CEO JWS… Each time, he got hurt but was able to overcome the suffering. He experienced a lot with CSH. He became little by little an adult. Yet his mother refused to see it. That’s why CSH and KJH are both saying the same at the end: they make the other a better person. CSH can become more cheerful and playful again, KJH has become a real man. He is her fence and her protector. They complete each other.
Striking is that CSH has a lot in common with the little prince as well. First, she possesses a painting representing The Little prince. We could interpret that the little prince embodies her inner child that she has long forgotten and is trapped in the painting.
Their situation is similar: both are lonely. He lived on his planet, she lived for her hotel. Secondly, both enjoy watching sunsets. The prince said he could watch 44 sunsets on his planet, when he felt sad. And we saw how the sunset in Cuba had such an impact on She could forget her sad life, this even marked the time of her awakening: trying to enjoy life differently. That’s why we have this.
Yet after meeting the boyfriend’s mother and her rejection, Cha Soo Hyun is once again confronted with the reality, the world of adults. The beholder witnesses how affected she is.
Notice how she is sitting next to the little prince. She has always been turning her back on him, in a sense we could say that she has been trying not to acknowledge her “inner child”, although we know that CSH had started changing. Nonetheless, the way this scene was taken underlines another aspect: we barely see the little prince, hence we come to the conclusion that his presence has been even reduced. Don’t forget that she is about to break up with JH. Moreover, the wall/door on the side which covers the face of the little prince could be interpreted as the pressure CSH is feeling right now. She is again fighting against her inner demons: the right to be happy. She feels that happiness can only be a dream. For her, unhappiness means reality. Reality is linked to being a grown-up. She associates reality and adulthood with unhappiness since no adult around her has ever been shown happy. See her ex-husband, her mother (never satisfied with her actual life), her father (regretting his bad choice), her ex-mother-in-law, her secretary Nam (he stopped being a journalist, never confessed to his loved one…), JMJ trying to chase the perfect husband … Moreover, I sense that she might even think that she, the princess, is cursed to be unhappy in her life therefore her curse might affect JH’s family. This is the real reason for the break-up.
Bebebisous33s' analyses in K-dramaland and manhwas 