Customer Reviews

A Guide for Grown-ups: Essential Wisdom from the Collected Works of Antoine de Saint-Exupry

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Let it be understood that this is a coffee table/bathroom type book. The kind of book you pick up and select a few pages and read and meditate on what it is you have just read. Perhaps you share it with a friend and get engrossed in a discussion after reading only a page or two. I suppose you could read it from cover to cover, and although you would be finished quickly I think you would be missing the point of encapsulating the brunt of a prolific writer's works into 96 pages each with only one or two sentences on them. The idea is to revisit the world of Antione de Saint-Exupery and linger a little bit longer than you did the first time you read his works.

If you are familiar with the works of Antoine De Saint-Exupery, you will probably recognize just what part of each story the quotes are taken from. You will also instantly recall the magical way in which Saint-Exupery was able to reveal the his subtle wisdom in regards to happiness, friendhsip, love, grief, etc. in a way that was accessible to children, but still profound to the most discerning adult. If you are only familiar with The Little Prince, than perhaps this little guide will do a lot to bring you up to speed on Saint-Exupery's entire body of everyday philosophy.

I doubt that anyone who has never heard of Saint-Exupery or any of his stories will appreciate this book much. The magic of Saint-Exupery has to be experienced before one learns how to detect the depth of his thoughts in these short quotations. As a gift this book is still an excellent idea, but perhaps it should be given in conjunction with at least one other Saint-Exupery book, if the recipient is completely new to Saint Exupery.

I will serenely conclude here before I start taking my opinion too seriously.

Lovely quotations regarding Love, Friendship etc. that make you feel all warm and cozy. Makes you want to pick up and read Wind, Sand, Stars and The Little Prince all over again and also look up at the stars once again with new feeling.

This is an extremely short read. It took me 10 minutes, and I am a slow reader. The quotes have been pulled from Exupery's seven works. I am not crazy about Exupery's storytelling such as The Little Prince, but I can tell that he was a deep and caring thinker. Every now and then one of his observations is so artistically succinct and beautifully rendered that it bears restatement.

Here are my favorite quotes from this book:

"People haven't time to learn anything. They buy things ready-made in the stores. But since there are no stores where you can buy friends, people no longer have friends."

"Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction."

"People have forgotten this truth... But you musn't forget it. You become responsible forever for what you have tamed."

"A civilization is built on what is required of men, not on that which is provided for them."

"The tree is more than first a seed, then a stem, then a living trunk, and then a dead timber. The tree is a slow, enduring force straining to win the sky."

"What ought we be? That is the essential question, the question that concerns spirit and not intelligence. For spirit impregnates intelligence with the creation that is to come forth. And later, intelligence is brought to bed of creation."

"Experience will guide us to the rules. You cannot make rules precede practical experience."

"Life creates order, but order does not create life."

"One sees clearly only with the heart. Anything essential is invisible to the eye."

Four Stars

As one who read in 1969 French Class "Le Petit Prince"...and grew up with the Katherine Woods English translation. I am VERY DISAPPOINTED in this book, as are many others.
[...]
"...beware of the new translation if you've previously read and enjoyed the Katherine Woods version. Mr. Howard makes the argument in his "translator's note" that the language has changed since the 1940's and that a new translation is needed. I couldn't disagree more. And I [do] speak with some experience on this subject: I read this title at school in the original French language for three different classes, as well as numerous times in English (the Woods version). Katherine Woods beautifully captured the feel of the French original. The new, Howard translation is in a more modern English which mostly succeeds at removing the poetry that previously existed and little else that I can find. It does not make the story any more clear or nuanced than it previously was, rather less so. I find the arguments for a new translation indefencible [sic]."

EVEN the editor's page vii of "A Guide..." uses the NEW translation of the quintessentially known phrase:
St. Ex' FRENCH: "On ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur. L'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux."
Howard's TransBlation [sic]: "One sees clearly only with the heart. Anything essential is invisible to the eyes." [literary direct translation]
K. Woods Translation: "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." [poetic clarity]
Decide for yourself which one touches your heart. The K. Woods version is only available as a used book or in library. I suggest that we write to Harcourt Inc. [...] NEW version/ Harcourt Brace OLD version same [...] AND demand an ADDITIONAL release of the K. Woods version.

After just being introduced to the "Little Prince", I wanted more. This book is nice to have around to read when things seem out of control and the stress level is getting high. This would be a nice book to give as a gift or have in the guest room for those visitors who may need a little 'essential wisdom'.

I'm a huge fan of St. Exupery. His writings are fantastic. This book pulls out some of the beautiful prose he wrote and oh it's just wonderful to open the book to some page, read the passage/phrase and then sit and savor it, meditate on it. I love this book. Glad it was compiled. Highly highly recommended.

"of your troubles that you find serenity."-from Wartime Writings 1939-1944

This small, 83 page book, Guide for Grown-ups, contains selected quotes from the several books and poems that Antoine de Saint-Exupery wrote during his lifetime. The title for this review contains the only words found on page 72. I picked up this book the other day and this quote really spoke to me at this time in my life. I bought several of these with the intention of giving them out as gifts. I still have one left; the quotes are great ones to meditate on. Antoine de Saint-Exupery, writer of The Little Prince, was an aviator who served in the French Air Corps during WWII; he presumably died in 1944 during a mission flying over the Mediterranean. I haven't read any of his books, however, I do love this little one.

This is a must read for all adults. There are so many explanations about emotions and the meaning of love and respect for other humans. After all, we are a disgusting species considering what we do to each other and what we do to ourselves. I am a better man for reading the book.

For me this collection of excerpts from Antoine Saint Exupery's writings serves a particular purpose. When I present "The Little Prince" to a young person, I also buy this volume for the parent/s. Interesting by itself though not as satisfying as The Little Prince, it does make an enjoyable read for an adult and gives the parent the flavour of Saint Exupery's writings.

Many are familiar with the remarkable French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupery through the much beloved Little Prince. Far fewer can place this in the context of a larger body of work noteworthy for its depth and significance.

This book, which exists as an exercise in posthumous marketing (great gift for grads), is nonetheless valuable in exposing the range of Saint-Exupery's thinking in an easily accessible format.

Quotes from a cross section of the author's works are organized into sections on happiness, friendship, love, responsibility, fortitude, and what is essential. Here are three of my favorites:

"If your love has no hope of being welcomed do not voice it; for if it be silent it can endure, a guarded flame, within you."

"The tree is more than first a seed, then a stem, then a living trunk, and then dead timber. The tree is a slow, enduring force straining to win the sky".

"Behind all seen things lies something vaster; everything is but a path, a portal, or a window opening on something other than itself."

And here's one that should have been included, but wasn't...

"What makes the desert beautiful is that somewhere it hides a well".

Wisdom indeed.