“You just need to grow up, and a merciful God will leave you to your own devices,” – this metaphorical phrase from the writer and pilot may hold the key to understanding the twists and turns of his life journey.
The Safety of the World
Antoine Marie Jean-Baptiste Roger de Saint-Exupéry was born on June 29, 1900, in Lyon. References to the ancient aristocratic lineage of Count Antoine de Saint-Exupéry date back to 1235. The old Provençal nobility were the ancestors of his mother, Marie Bouaïé de Foncillon, who had a medical education and was passionate about poetry (even publishing her own collection), painting, and music. These talents were inherited by her son: Antoine was a skilled painter, poet, and violinist. His father did not have the chance to raise and support five children; when Antoine, affectionately called Tonio in his childhood, was just four years old, the insurance inspector Martin-Louis Jean Exupéry passed away from a stroke.
After her husband’s death, the widowed mother moved in with her own mother, taking the children to the family estate of La Molle on the Mediterranean coast. Antoine lived there, as well as with his cousin, the Viscountess Tricot, in her home on Place Bellecour in Lyon or at the country estate of Saint-Maurice de Remans. His childhood was the happiest and most carefree period of his life, a fact he nostalgically recalled in letters to his mother: “I’m not sure I lived after I parted with my childhood. Nothing ever gave me such confidence in the safety of the world as the cozy stove in the upper room at Saint-Maurice.”
The house in Lyon where Antoine de Saint-Exupéry was born. The street now bears his name.
The Dreamer and the Stargazer
From a young age, Antoine showed a knack for experimentation and creativity: he invented engines and constructed an airplane by attaching sheets to a bicycle frame made of willow branches, racing it in hopes of one day lifting off the ground. His fascination with the sky and stars earned him the nicknames “The Dreamer” and “The Stargazer.” The boy celebrated flying machines in his poems (“Wings swayed in the evening breeze, the engine’s song lulled the soul”) and excelled in mathematics, which would later aid him in his inventions: he would become not only a pilot but also a mechanic with five registered patents to his name.
Saint-Exupéry studied with his younger brother François at Jesuit colleges Notre-Dame de Sainte-Croix (Le Mans) and Notre-Dame de Mongré in Villefranche-sur-Saône, and continued his education at the Marist College of Villa Saint-Jean in Fribourg, Switzerland, where his brother tragically died of rheumatic heart disease during his teenage years. In this close-knit family, three girls and two boys grew up: François was Antoine’s closest friend, and Antoine suffered greatly when he was left alone. “Friendship cannot be bought,” Saint-Exupéry would say, reflecting on the irreparable losses he would face in the future.
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry with his brother and sisters.
The Decision is Made
After graduating from high school, Antoine continued his education at Bossuet School in Paris, later transferring to the boarding school at Lycée Saint-Louis, where he studied an additional mathematics course necessary for preparing for the entrance exam to the naval academy. Ironically, the future writer failed the entrance exam due to his essay: he did not elaborate on the impressions of an Alsatian returning from war to a village that had once again become French. “I wasn’t there, I don’t know,” he refused to speculate, doubting the correctness of his chosen path.
Later, Saint-Exupéry enrolled as a free listener in the architecture department at the Academy of Arts, but he abandoned that education in favor of his dream of the sky. The boy with a pencil truly yearned to be a pilot. He first took to the skies at the age of 12 as a passenger on a plane with one of aviation’s pioneers, and he was forever captivated by the romantic and heroic work of a person at the controls, never losing hope of one day flying a winged machine himself. As soon as the flight school announced its recruitment, Antoine thought of nothing else. His courage knew no bounds, and the young daredevil was ready to dedicate himself to his country.
Alone with the Engine
In 1921, Saint-Exupéry was drafted into the army, and he did everything possible to end up in the 2nd Fighter Aviation Regiment in Strasbourg. His first step in his career was a working team in the repair workshops, but soon the novice successfully passed the civil pilot exam. After being transferred to Morocco, Antoine received his military pilot’s license, honed his skills in reserve officer courses, and at the age of 22, as a junior lieutenant, was assigned to an aviation regiment in Le Bourget near Paris. After surviving his first plane crash the following year, Antoine suffered a traumatic brain injury, was discharged, and turned to literature in Paris.
But the sky would not let him go. After the army, Saint-Exupéry was hired by the company Aéropostale: he piloted airmail to Africa, servicing the route Toulouse – Casablanca – Dakar. At 26, he was appointed station chief on the edge of the Sahara, where he wrote his first novel, “Southern Mail.” “I get tired of myself very quickly, and because of this, I can accomplish nothing in life,” Saint-Exupéry confided in a letter to a close friend in 1926. “But I need freedom so much!” “You can’t imagine the peace and freedom you feel at an altitude of 4,000 meters alone with the engine,” Saint-Exupéry admitted to his mother. And in 1927, he wrote to her about his secret desire to write: “I have so much to say! I want to be seen in what I write – the essence of my thoughts, observations, and feelings.”
At the Risk of Life
As the technical director of the Argentine branch of Aéropostale, Saint-Exupéry traveled to South America, where he was met with both his debut publication and a prestigious award for his work in Africa. For rescuing injured pilots in dangerous areas with hostile populations and contributing to the development of civil aviation, pilot Saint-Exupéry became a Knight of the Legion of Honor in 1930. His bravery, composure, dedication, and expertise were highlighted in the award nomination. After all, working as the airfield manager in Cap-Juby involved life-threatening risks, surrounded by hostile tribes in the desert.
In this new work region that same year, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry personally engaged in the search for his friend-pilot Henri Guillaumet, who had crashed in the Andes. The novel “Night Flight” was the next documentary testament to the dangers faced by aviators. Saint-Exupéry’s flying biography included several plane crashes, where he barely escaped from a sinking cockpit or crashed in the desert. There were times when he was the sole survivor of a two-member crew. After a plane collided with a sand dune, he and a mechanic were once rescued from dehydration in the desert by Bedouins.
Saint-Exupéry beside a crashed plane in the Libyan desert.
The Military Cross
Numerous fractures later restricted the pilot’s movements, making it difficult for him to even put on his flight suit. But he could no longer live without risk and had grown accustomed to the pain from accumulated injuries. As he became less fit for flying, he needed it more. He told his superiors that he felt a “physical and spiritual need” for it. No crash deterred him from taking off again, including creatively. In the 1930s, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry tried his hand at filmmaking: based on one of his scripts, director Raymond Bernard made the film “Anna-Marie” in 1936.
In the following year, the writer, in his own plane (which he acquired in 1935), set off as a correspondent for the Paris evening newspaper Paris Soir to war-torn Spain. The day after France declared war on Germany, Saint-Exupéry arrived at the military airfield in Toulouse for mobilization. Two months later, he was transferred to a combat aviation unit for long-range reconnaissance. “When the forest is burning in Provence, people go out against the fire with buckets and shovels,” wrote the 39-year-old pilot. “I must fight in this war, for everything I hold dear is now at risk.” For combat flights on reconnaissance missions, “the count at the controls” was awarded the Military Cross.
Forbidden Weapon
On the eve of the capitulation, referred to as an armistice, in July 1940, the 2/33 group, in which Saint-Exupéry served, was sent to evacuate to Algeria, and after the signing of the armistice, his weapon in North Africa became the written word. In 1942-43, he wrote in the U.S. the novellas “Wind, Sand and Stars” and “Letter to a Hostage,” which were to become the arsenal of the French Resistance. However, the book “Wind, Sand and Stars” was banned in both parts of the country: while the Nazis and the puppet Vichy government deemed the publication propaganda for the Resistance, supporters of de Gaulle criticized the book for its “defeatist sentiments.” All these events did not add optimism to the pilot, who was sinking deeper into depression.
Seeking solace through “the magic of memory,” Antoine warmed himself with memories of his childhood home and realized he desperately needed the warmth of a family hearth. Would he manage to create his own hearth and find the woman who would calm his anxieties? France’s defeat forced the writer to move to the U.S., where his intensified “midlife crisis” immediately made itself known. Saint-Exupéry had many plans, yet he again sought the right to take the controls of a military plane. He was no longer young, and moreover, he was injured, but could that hold him back? After receiving permission for nine more combat flights in the summer of 1944, the 44-year-old Major Saint-Exupéry did not return from his ninth flight, forever remaining in the sky, just like his Little Prince…
A Parable of Loneliness
In New York, Saint-Exupéry wrote in 1942 his most famous work – the parable-fable about loneliness, “The Little Prince.” The writer created an autobiographical hero – little Tonio, who got lost in the adult world. This is the same happy child who grew into a disillusioned adult. Such is the life of a modern person on a planet that needs “a gardener for people.” The image of the Little Prince is also used by Saint-Exupéry in the text of his previous book “Wind, Sand and Stars.”
It so happened that the previous book, which was compiled from the pilot’s notes during his treatment in a New York hospital after his plane crash in Guatemala, also had a connection to the U.S. In 1938, the accident, which claimed the life of the mechanic, occurred during a climb while attempting to fly from New York to Tierra del Fuego. Antoine was severely injured at that time. The printing house gifted him a souvenir copy of the first edition, printed on aviation canvas. In France, the 1939 book was awarded the Grand Prize of the French Academy.
Where Are Your Wings?
The image of a winged boy sitting on a cloud was something the artist Saint-Exupéry would absentmindedly draw on scraps of paper during breaks between combat flights. Gradually, the wings transformed into a long scarf (which the author himself wore), and the cloud became an asteroid. The original illustrations were included in the first American edition of the tale, which has been published worldwide in a total circulation of about 200 million copies. In the U.S., the writer’s most successful work was published in 1943 by Reynal & Hitchcock in both French and English. The philosophical meaning of the parable resonates with readers even today, as many recognize the archetypes of the characters.
The fox in “The Little Prince” symbolizes a loyal friend, but in reality, the character who taught the hero “to be responsible for those he tamed” is considered to be Antoine’s American friend, Sylvia Reinhardt (they shared a close friendship). With its large ears in the illustration, Saint-Exupéry’s character resembles a little desert fennec fox that he had tamed in Morocco. And the touching and willful Rose represents the writer’s “sick love,” the archetype of his wife, Consuelo. They met in Buenos Aires and married in 1930. The impulsive young Latin American woman was referred to by acquaintances as the “Salvadoran volcano.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry with his wife Consuelo.
Memories of the Rose
“Tonio loved good company, but phone calls terrified him, for he was by nature a recluse,” wrote Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry in her memoirs “Memories of the Rose.” Antoine himself expressed similar sentiments in a letter to his mother: “Few can say they know me at all: I don’t open my soul to people.” When the writer called Consuelo to Paris, he warned her not to inform the press. The Salvadoran journalist, writer, and artist herself had ties to that industry. However, when she once came to interview Antoine, the writer was surprised: he paid little attention to his wife’s career.
Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry (Sunsin-Sandoval-Cecilia) hailed from the Salvadoran city of Armenia. Her parents were wealthy landowners, allowing her to receive an education in the U.S., France, and Mexico. Despite her youth, she was marrying for the third time. “I would like to have from you the same understanding as a mother has for her son,” Saint-Exupéry advised his wife. His mother was the dearest person in the world to Antoine, who grew up without paternal guidance. “I need you as much as I did in childhood,” the brave pilot would repeat to his mother until the end of his days. He explained to her that he expected “help in alleviating his anxieties” from his wife, but the model of their relationship with Consuelo did not allow for that.
Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry (1942).
The Saint-Exupéry Syndrome
The writer even halted the registration of their marriage in America, saddened that his relatives were not present at the ceremony in the town hall. “You understand me, don’t you?” he asked through tears of his elegantly dressed bride. And she understood: the wedding was called off. The groom fervently thanked her for supporting his decision. They had to postpone the ceremony to Paris. This nervous and restless union has long intrigued psychotherapists. Anxiety, grievances, manipulation, mutual betrayals – a toxic cocktail for testing feelings. Yet the marriage endured, exhausting both and becoming an illustration of the “Saint-Exupéry Syndrome” (in medical psychology, this refers to “caring for those you have tamed”).
The writer continued to nurture his “Rose under a glass dome,” showering her with beautiful letters like this one: “Consuelo, I am happy to have such a wife and want to meet you in eternity after death.” 160 love letters with drawings and photographs by Saint-Exupéry are now owned by the widow of gardener José Martínez-Fructuoso, to whom “Rose” Consuelo bequeathed her estate and rights to the writer’s memorabilia after her death. She did not make such a gift to the writer’s relatives out of spite – she sought revenge for their mockery and condemnation (they called her a “comic countess”). Now the heirs from both sides have much to deal with: the writer’s former daughter-in-law passed away in 1979, and they are still litigating over the right to publish documents without the consent of the other party.
The wedding of Antoine and Consuelo (the bride in a black dress).
“He is Doomed”
“The man was doomed to die,” wrote Consuelo. Was this a premonition of the “black widow” (all her husbands met untimely ends) or “creative intuition”? Saint-Exupéry often spoke with his wife about death: “Drowning is easy. Let me tell you about it…” Even to the squadron chief Jean Lela, the pilot half-jokingly informed him that a fortune-teller had predicted his death at sea: “Did she take me for a sailor or what?” And when disaster struck in 1944, someone immediately recalled this curious fact from Saint-Exupéry’s life.
On July 31, 1944, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry disappeared without a trace over the island of Corsica. He took off from the Borgo airfield on a reconnaissance flight and did not return. Before vanishing into the sky over the Mediterranean Sea, the pilot had mastered the new high-speed P-38 Lightning aircraft and wrote on July 9-10, 1944: “I have a delightful profession at 44. But flying at ten thousand meters is better than Algerian laziness. I chose work to the maximum and must squeeze myself dry. It would be nice if this vile war ended before I fade away. After all, I still have things to do.”
The military bracelet of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, found in 1998 in the Mediterranean Sea.
The Last Mystery
On the eve of his fateful flight, the pilot concluded a long conversation with General Gavaul by handing him a small suitcase containing his manuscripts. “We cried, and I left him with the suitcase very late,” the general recalled. “It felt like a farewell. I thought he sensed that he would soon be gone.” For a long time, the circumstances of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s death remained unknown. It was assumed that he crashed in the Alps. Only in 1998 did a fisherman near Marseille pull a bracelet from the sea engraved with the names of the pilot and his wife: Antoine, Consuelo. The bracelet also bore the address of the publishing house that printed Saint-Exupéry’s books. In May 2000, a diver discovered scattered wreckage of a plane at a depth of 70 meters over a kilometer stretch, which could belong to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.
Remains of the Lockheed P-38 Lightning that Saint-Exupéry flew when he disappeared over the Mediterranean Sea. The wreckage was found and identified in 2004.
Three years later, the destroyed aircraft was raised and identified: it was indeed the same plane that Saint-Exupéry had flown. The Luftwaffe logs did not contain any records of planes shot down in the region on that day, the wreckage showed no signs of gunfire, and no remains of the pilot were found. Theories about an accident or the pilot’s suicide amid depression were joined by speculation about possible desertion. An 86-year-old Luftwaffe veteran immediately claimed he shot down that plane with his Messerschmitt. Verification revealed that the old man was lying: it turned out he wanted to protect the pilot from unfounded suspicions. The wreckage is now preserved in the Aviation and Space Museum in Le Bourget, and the main theories suggest human error or technical malfunction led to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s plane crashing into the sea. Let’s recall how the story of the Little Prince ends? The narrator did not find his body, so did the Little Prince return to his planet?