The Folio Society Restore The Little Prince To Its Stunning Original Glory
Restored Edition Includes Exclusive New Commentary Book with Original Sketches
The Little Prince
Text and Illustrations by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
Introduction by Stacey Schiff
Last week I was lucky enough to be offered to review The Folio Society's new edition of The Little Prince. I have a real soft spot for classic children's books particularly if they are beautiful editions I can display on my library shelves. This edition fits in perfectly with my collection of vintage and beautiful editions of classic children's books being presented in a glorious hardback edition, with a gorgeous slipcase and beautiful end papers. I am in love and I can see many more Folio edition books ending up in my collection if the quality of them are even half as good as this one. It's a really special book to own and one I will treasure.
Using a painstaking production process, The Folio Society has used a 1943 edition to restore each image of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince to its vibrant, original colouring.
Using a painstaking production process, The Folio Society has used a 1943 edition to restore each image of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince to its vibrant, original colouring.
Illustration for The Folio Society edition of The Little Prince by Antoine
de Saint-Exupéry © the Estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Société
Civile pour l’Oeuvre et la Memoire d’Antoine de Saint-Exupéry)
First
published in 1943, and since translated into 270 languages and 26
different alphabets, few books have touched the world like Antoine de
Saint-Exupéry’s modern fable The Little Prince. In its first The
Folio Society edition, this definitive two-volume set includes a new
introduction by his biographer and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Stacy
Schiff, as well as restored versions of Saint-Exupéry’s unforgettable
illustrations, as inseparable from the story as the words themselves.
Already
a best-selling French author and pioneering pilot, Saint-Exupéry wrote
his most cherished work while in secluded, self-imposed exile in America
after escaping the fall of France to the Germans in 1940. Armed with a
set of children’s watercolours and a typewriter, he created a story that
was both a wide-eyed celebration of childhood adventure and a sombre,
existential work of startling depth. A year after its publication,
Saint-Exupéry took off on a mission over the Mediterranean and
disappeared, his body never to be found. In Schiff’s poetic words, the
author and his prince would forever ‘remain tangled together, twin
innocents who fell from the sky’.
Before
his doomed return to Europe, Saint-Exupéry left a working copy of the
manuscript, including numerous illustrations not included in the first
edition, with his friend Silvia Hamilton, in ‘a rumpled paper bag’. The commentary volume
to The Folio Society edition includes these preliminary sketches and
drawings, accompanied by a page-by-page description by Christine Nelson,
curator of the recent celebrated exhibition of the collection at New
York’s Morgan Library and Museum.
Illustration for The Folio Society edition of The Little Prince by Antoine
de Saint-Exupéry © the Estate of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Société
Civile pour l’Oeuvre et la Memoire d’Antoine de Saint-Exupéry)
As
a nod to the book’s origins, the illustrations retain their original
French captions. The binding on the main volume is a striking yellow
with the unmistakable image of the prince staring out at the stars,
while the commentary volume is bound in blue in a rippling design by
celebrated designer Paul Bonet used on an early French edition of the
work.
Two-volume set
· The Little Prince (Bound
in blocked cloth. Set in Bembo Infant. 112 pages. 40 integrated colour
illustrations. Printed endpapers. 8¾˝x 6¼˝. Blocked slipcase.
: preliminary sketches, drawings and commentary by Christine Nelson exclusive with The Folio Society edition)
· Commentary volume (Bound in blocked paper. 80 pages. 36 integrated colour illustrations. 8¾˝x 6¼˝)
: preliminary sketches, drawings and commentary by Christine Nelson exclusive with The Folio Society edition)
· Commentary volume (Bound in blocked paper. 80 pages. 36 integrated colour illustrations. 8¾˝x 6¼˝)
About The Folio Society | www.foliosociety.com
For
seventy years, The Folio Society has been publishing beautiful
illustrated editions of the world’s greatest books. It believes that the
literary content of a book should be matched by its physical form. With
specially researched images or newly commissioned illustrations, many
of its editions are further enhanced with introductions written by
leading figures in their fields: novelists, journalists, academics,
scientists and artists. Exceptional in content and craftsmanship, and
maintaining the very highest standards of fine book production, Folio
Society editions last for generations.
Comments
As for Folio Society, I discovered their magnificent books three or four years ago. I have amassed just over 20 of them and, now, one more with The Little Prince :)