The flyleaf reads: Ex Libris-Arlene T. Abuel, 6 March 1976
That’s right, I got acquainted with The Little Prince more than thirty two years ago and it’s now a foxed copy in my shelf after reading and re-reading it for the nth time. Last night, I just felt the urge to read it again. Though it is considered a children’s book, The Little Prince makes profound insights about human nature. It’s a deeply moving tale written in riddles and laced with poetic metaphor. It’s a heartfelt exposition of sadness and solitude and it teaches lessons for all of us.
A part of my journal entry (Drops of Ink in A Blue Sand -24 October 1977) was all about this book. “And that afternoon I deliberately didn’t punch-in my time card only to see a movie with Grace somewhere along C.M. Recto. How we cried at the thought of saying goodbye, at The Little Prince’s secret, it is only with the heart that one can see rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eyes.” How we followed every word, remembering those much-thumb thoughts and heavily underlined passages of the equally beautiful book of de Saint-Exupery. We left the movie house with misty eyes but filled with new hopes and pleasant thoughts of tomorrow and the next green, blue and yellow mornings of our lives”. I was still a student librarian then and in my third year of Economics course in UST.
I would not attempt to summarize the book here(it probably has been done more than a thousand times) but I’d like to quote some of the unforgettable lines I found in it.
* I do not know how to see sheep through the walls of boxes. Perhaps, I am a little like the grown-ups. I have had to grow old.
* you know, one loves the sunset, when one is so sad
* if someone loves a flower, of which just one single blossom grows, in all the millions of stars, it is enough to make him happy just to look at the stars.
* i must endure the presence of two or three caterpillars if I wish to become acquainted with the butterflies
* there is no shop in the world where one can buy friendships
* it is only with the heart that one can see rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eyes
* one sits down on a desert sand dune, sees nothing, hears nothing, yet through the silence something throbs and gleams
* but the eyes are blind, one must look with the heart.
More quotes can be found in the book but I guess it is better to read the whole book again. It’s just like remembering childhood dreams too!
Dreams And Escapes 
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