Explaining Saint-Exupéry’s Paris to Japanese visitors
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Saint-Exupéry and his Little Prince are popular icons in Japan. And Paris is one of the preferred destinations for Japanese tourists. The Musée de France website specially designed for Japanese visitors features a map of « Saint-Exupéry’s Paris ».
Following the guide created by Yoko Masuda, tourists can visit key places in the life of the writer. |
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Saint-Exupéry came to Paris in 1917, more specifically to Saint-Germain des Prés. In 1920, he signed up to audit courses at the architecture department of the Ecole des Beaux Arts art school. His favourite haunts were Brasserie Lipp (151, Boulevard Saint-Germain, Paris VI) or La Coupole, two spots where the young Antoine enjoyed writing and meeting friends. |
| Yoko Masuda guides Japanese tourists to places that were important to Saint-Exupéry, like the apartment of his friend Captain Priou (12, rue Petit, Paris XIX) or the studio (24, rue Barbey-de-Jouy, Paris VII) that he rented in 1938 for his wife Consuelo. |  |
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The web guide is also a panorama of all the venues that celebrate the author of The Little Prince. Yoko Masuda invites his fellow-countrymen to visit the Panthéon and track down the inscription in honour of Saint-Exupéry, or Le Bourget airport, from which the aviator took off in1935 on his bid to beat the Paris-Saigon flight record and, above all, the Musée de l’Air et de l’Espace with its dedicated IWC/Saint-Exupéry section that takes the visitor deep into the life of the pilot.
For friends of the Little Prince, the collection at the Musée des Lettres et Manuscrits includes the manuscripts of Les lettres à l’inconnue – (letters to an unknown) and Au centre du desert (in the centre of the desert), the central chapter of Wind, Sand and Stars.
Friends from Japan, welcome to the Paris of Saint-Exupéry! |
Find out more: Musée de France (site in Japanese).