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experienced the moment when he had to give up on his dream to become a great painter.
That is why, at the age of six, I gave up what might have been a magnificent career as a painter. I had been disheartened by the failure of
my Drawing Number One and my Drawing Number Two. Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is tiresome for children to
be always and forever explaining things to them. p. 11
It is clear now that grown-ups in the novel play the same role as parents in the real wolrd. They play a role as someone who has power above the narrator.
b. Narrow-Mindedness
The second thing that represents the deeper meaning of grown-ups is narrow-mindedness. Grown-ups in The Little Prince is a representation of people
who are not able to think openly. Antoine 1943 said the narrator posits that grown-ups cannot make their own interpretations of the world. They are too
dumb. Therefore, children are needed to enlighten adults about how to approach and make sense of the world p. 11.
Here, the narrator portrays how sense-making is implicitly different between adults and children.
In the course of this life I have had a great many encounters with a great many people who have been concerned with matters of consequence. I
have lived a great deal among grown-ups. I have seen them intimately, close at hand. And that has not much improved my opinion of them. p.
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The narrator posits the grown-ups as another kind of individual. The narrator clearly tells us that he does not like this kind of individual, and even after
the length of time spent to live like them and accept as it is, the narrator still cannot get along with the grown-
ups‟ way of thinking. The narrator never really care about the grown-ups around him. Even though he is one of them, he is
different. He looks at them from a distance. He cannot associate with them. He cannot have the same perspective of seeing the world. He and the grown-ups are
very different. Even from the very first chapter, the narrator‟s drawing of boa and
elephant showed implicitly to the readers that grown-ups never think beyond the surface. They are lack of imagination. They just care about something that is real,
sense full matter. When the narrator thinks that he found someone who has his mind opened,
he gives this person a test to see if they really have the true understanding that would allow him to communicate on some deeper level with the person. The
person fails the experiment so the narrator knows that the expectations he had of this person have not been realized. He knows now that to communicate with this
person he has to lower himself to the person‟s level, it is unsatisfying and
disappointing. Of course that the person he talked to does not realize his intention of doing that test.
Whenever I met one of them who seemed to me at all clear-sighted, I tried the experiment of showing him my Drawing Number One, which I have
always kept. I would try to find out, so, if this was a person of true understanding. But, whoever it was, he, or she, would always say: That is
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Then I would never talk to that person about boa constrictors, or primeval forests, or stars. I would bring myself down to his level. I would talk to
him about bridge, and golf, and politics, and neckties. And the grown-up would be greatly pleased to have met such a sensible man. p. 11
Therefore, in the characteristic part Chapter Four is explained that the narrator is a lonesome man. It is because grown-ups around him never match his
open-minded way of thinking. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
