MICHAEL MACE - How To Make Autistic Children Happy: A Tribute To The Little Prince

This book about autism and the experiences with autistic children, got its theme from another book that sold at more than 140 million copies worldwide and has been translated into 250 languages and dialects. It has become the most translated book in the world.

There is a museum dedicated to this book in Japan, an Opera in USA and Germany, and a musical in France and in Korea. It has been and is still being taught in many school programs all around the world! There is also a Soviet movie, an American movie, a German movie, a French movie that were made out of it. There are even cartoons in French, English and Japanese that were also made from out of it. Not to mention radio plays, live stage, film screen, television, ballet, and other operatic works.

Furthermore, can you believe that even the Asteroid Bsixdouze (B-612), belonging to the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter was named after this story?

Yes, I am speaking of The Little Prince. And this book about autism wants to pay tribute to this wonderful story. There will be times that I will refer to this book written by Antoine de Saint-Exupry. It is for one simple reason: even though its hero, the Little Prince, is a speaking little boy, hes from another planet like the autistic children can seem to be because our world of language is not adapted to them. One can even say, the language didnt adopt them.

The Historical Background of The Little Prince

Lets travel to the greatest beach in the world. Its so great that you can walk (and even drive) for days and days in the sand of that beach and still not reach the sea! I am talking here of the Sahara Desert! Is it not therein the Saharathat the Little Prince appeared? Is it not also over the Sahara that, in real life, a pilot named Antoine de Saint-Exupry, started having engine trouble?

On December 31 st , 1935, Saint-Exupry and his companion Andr Prvot crashed into the Sahara desert, somewhere in Libya, as they were trying to establish a new record for the liaison between Paris and Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City).

They both survived the crash but their plane didnt make it. They had no idea of their precise location and there was no civilization in sight as far as their eyes could see. They could see plenty of sand and rocks in all directions far to the horizon, but no sign of human life!

These 2 men were left with only a thermos of coffee, some chocolate, and a handful of crackers which was but a short supply for such a dire situation. After a while, they quickly began to experience visual and auditory hallucinations, and by the third day, they were so dehydrated that they ceased to sweat. Imagine? Ceasing to sweat in the Sahara! Fortunately, on the fourth day, a Bedouin on a camel discovered them, and saved them from certain death.

In the book, The Little Prince, the story of the pilot being stranded in the desert was based on this experience of Saint-Exupry, which he wrote in Long Island, New York in 1943.

1943! WWII! Saint-Exupry had been a hero during WWI and now he had been demobilized from the French Air Force because he had passed the maximum age for pilots and was in declining health. However, he had relations in high places which he used to rejoin the allied forces as a pilot. The following year, he died in air combat, shot down by a German pilot (disappeared at sea, off the coast of Marseilles, France).

From the time that he had been rescued from a certain death when he was stranded in the Sahara to the time of his death, he had been living on borrowed time. Just enough time for him to write his most famous book, The Little Prince. Sad to say, he never lived to see the success of it.

Summary of The Little Prince

A plane crashed in the Sahara Desert, in the middle of nowhere, a thousand miles from any inhabited region! Nobody, no civilization in sight! After one nights sleep, the pilot was awakened by a voice:

Pleasedraw me a lamb!

The pilot saw a little boy and wondered where he came from. Finally, after a while, he asked him, So you too came from the sky? Which is your planet? He came to the conclusion that this little man was the Prince of the asteroid B-6-12.

Later on, the pilot learned that the Little Prince had a rose and a lamb on his (tiny) planet and he didnt want the lamb to eat the rose. In fact, the reason why the Little Prince left the planet to visit other planets was because he had an argument with the rose who was full of pride and very conceited because of its beauty. And it was after he had visited six other planets that he landed on earth, in the Sahara!

On earth, the Little Prince met a lot of characters. There he first met a snake that said, Whomever I touch, I send back to the earth from whence he came, said the serpent. Next, he also met a fox that revealed to him a secret, a great truth, saying, It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye .

On the 1 st anniversary of his landing on Earth, the Little Prince decided to go back to his planet and the snake helped him to do that. But before leaving, he promised that he would come back.

In this book about autism, I will be referring every now and then to some details from the book The Little Prince without always explaining them. If you have not already done so, I highly recommend you to read the book of Antoine de Saint Exupry..