Proposal

The Little Prince by Antoine De Saint-Exupéry certainly is not lacking in editions. It has been translated into over 300 languages and dialects, including even a version in Spanglish. This book is a treasured piece of literature that people across the globe have connected to, and this is due both to the story and writing as well as the illustrations that accompany it. However, because it has been dispersed so widely and in so many editions, a high degree of diversity has grown between these editions. One important source of variants that I’ve discovered in my research is the fact that a lot of the translations of the text have been made from the already translated version by Katherine Woods rather than the original French text. Since English is currently a more universally spoken language than French, some of the translations had to be made from English instead. There are specific instances where Katherine Woods’ translation strays from the French text which can be used to determine if another version of the book was translated from her translation or the original. In considering the artwork, the lines of the drawings stay consistent across versions, but the coloring does not. Although the original drawings by Antoine De Saint-Exupéry were made in aquarelle, the aquarelle in the printed books vary greatly from the originals. Finally, the book has also been made into a few computer games and game apps as well as an animated movie.

I would like to create an edition of this book that addresses the scale of distribution it has experienced across the world, but that relates the hundreds of editions back to its original. This would be valuable to anyone who has cherished the book, but mainly to English or French-speaking readers since I want to display how the translations have strayed from the original text. I would like to present my edition as an online compilation of these differences by having pages that display multiple versions of the same passages. I would also like to include variances in the artwork by displaying cover art and multiple versions of the artwork coloring from various editions around the world. This edition would focus less on creating a synthesis of former editions, but more on addressing the varieties that exist and displaying them as well as comparing the variances that have emerged to the actual original edition and even the original manuscript. Following Tanselle’s views on authorship, I want to include these variations to create an interplay between the editions rather than a synthesis of editions.