The Little Prince in Paris

The Little Prince in Paris Posted by Tim Hildreth on Feb 22, 2022 in Culture, Literature, Sports, Vocabulary

If you’re a long-time follower, you already know that one of France’s most famous contributions to the world of literature was not actually written in France. Now for the first time, the manuscript of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s Le Petit Prince is making a trip to Paris.

Photo CC0 from cottonbro at www.pexels.com

Le Petit Prince à Paris

Written and first published in New York City, the handwritten and hand drawn pages that would become Le Petit Prince are part of the permanent collection at the Morgan Library and have never left New York until now. For their voyage vers la France¹, the pages of the manuscript – which will be on display at the Musée des arts décoratifs de Paris, jusqu’au 26 juin² – where accompanied by Saint-Exupery’s arrière-petit-neveu³ on un vol d’Air France (bien sur!)⁴ flown by a pilot qui se dit inspire de deviner pilote par Saint-Exupery⁵.

Watch a video about their trip from FranceInfo here.

For some, Le Petit Prince is the “livre qui [leur] a donné envie d’apprendre à lire quand [elles étaient petites]”⁶. This book – written by “un rêveur”⁷ – est toujours d’actualité⁸ for it’s many fans.

Les Jeux Olympiques de Pékin

The latest edition of the JO d’hiver from Beijing wrapped up last week. France ended the two week competition in 12^ème position in the overall standings⁹ with 5 médailles d’or, 7 médailles d’argent, et 2 médailles de bronze¹⁰.

You can view a summary of the results here or dig into details of all the medals across all the competitions here. The first link, with its summarized table to results by country, is a good place to review the country names in French. The detailed results in the second link will give you lots of examples of the different names of winter sports in French.

If you need a little review first, check out the post below.

A little random vocabulary

A few weeks ago I introduced the term pantouflard which comes from the word pantoufle. It got me thinking about another kind of slipper that we keep around our house. We have a basket of pichous that we keep by the door in the winter for guest to wear after they take of their shoes. These knit woolen chaussons (another word for slippers) are a staple of many Quebecois homes. The original pichous were a type of moccasin common among the native populations and are named for an Amérindiens word for lynx. Ours were made by my partners grand-mère¹¹

And I’m not quite sure when or why, but it struck me recently that small French grocery stores are called épiceries because they are descended from moyenâgeux¹² sellers of épices¹³. Today they sell so much more, but you can still find du sel, du poivre, et d’autres épices at your local épicerie.

French Culture – The Little Prince

French Vocabulary – Winter Olympics Edition

1
trip to France
2
Museum of decorative arts in Paris through June 26
3
great great nephew
4
an Air France flight (of course!)
5
who says he was inspired by Saint-Exupery to become a pilot
6
the book that made them want to learn to read when they were small
7
A dreamer
8
is till relevant
9
10th for the number of golds
10
5 gold medals, 7 silver medals, and 2 bronze medals
11
grandmother
12
of the Middle Ages
13
spices

Tags: free French vocabulary, Jeux Olympiques, le petit prince, Saint-Exupery

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About the Author: Tim Hildreth

Since my first trip to France at 16, I have been a passionate francophile. I love the language, food, music, art, people, and more that make France and la Francophonie in general such an amazing part of our global community. Having lived in France and studied the language and culture for over 35 years, it is my great pleasure to be able to share a little bit of my deep love with you through this blog.

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