Customer Reviews

Saint-Exupery: A Biography

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

 

 

Easily one of the best biographies I've ever read, in part because its subject is not overexposed. Like many people, I came to Saint-Exupery via The Little Prince and knew very little about his life except "was a pilot, then he crashed."

The intense introspection of The Little Prince led me to an image of the author as a bit of a recluse, holed up in a study somewhere drawing pictures of pythons. The Saint-Ex discovered in this book, however, is engaged in near-constant adventure at the dawn of aviation. We see plane crashes (in the Sahara, in an open cockpit plane, in territory populated by hostile locals), kidnappings, poverty, love (and love lost), and war, and throughout it all Saint-Ex skims along with one foot in our world and one foot thoroughly in his own.

With the exception of a too-long discussion of Saint-Exupery's youth, this bio is paced well and is a fun and rewarding read. It has led me to an entirely new appreciation of Saint-Exupery, particularly his non-Prince writing.

Schiff's book is one of the best biographies I've ever read. Extremely well written and well researched, Schiff introduces us to a man and his adventures -in many ways an ordinary man, suffering from emotional and physical aches and pains and in many ways almost an ethereal being, filled with a capacity to write about the air, the desert, and the act of flying through and over both.

This is a detailed and interesting biography, as readers of other books by Stacy Schiff would expect. But don't buy it in paperback. The publisher skimped and cut corners, and it shows. The font is small and hard to read, with far too many places where broken type makes reading a tiring process. Important people with similar names are not clearly identified in the text, and there's no "cast of characters" to help the confused reader. Turn to the index and you'll find it of little use, as there is no distinction between an important relationship and a glancing reference. The footnotes are printed in incredibly small print and are hard to follow. The paperback also appears to lack many of the photos that were included in the hardback version. So if you are interested in Saint-Exupery, bide your time and keep an eye on used book sales for the hardcover version.

I thought this book would be fascinating, but I allowed myself to give up after 100 pages or so. It was tedious and tiresome. A book in need of a good editor.

I wanted to like this book, as I have a fascination with this period in history. Unfortunately in order to like the book I needed a much deeper knowledge of all things French than I possess.( I do speak the language.) There was copious name dropping that meant nothing to me. I don't know who Rene Delange, Jacques Chardonne or Emile Raccaud were, so when they, along with hundreds of other people I had never heard of, were frequently introduced into the book with the expectation that I, the reader, knew who they were and why they were important to the story, I simply yawned and lost interest. I think Saint-Ecupery was probably a fascinating man, but if you want to know him, I would suggest that you read one of the books he wrote himslf, and catch a short bio of him from Wikepedia instead of plowing through this exhaustive biography.

I'm sure it's a good book, but the type is soooooo small that I need to purchase a good magnifying glass in order to find out.

It's a real shame that the publisher used such bad judgment in choosing the font size. The print on part of the page is bold and part not-bold and almost too faded to read even though the book is new. Hope they find another printer next time. Very disappointing since I was really looking forward to reading this book.

Thank you very much ...book was in very good condition and I received it in a timely manner...