Set to land in Cannes, The Little Prince reigns in Turkey

The wisdom and whimsy of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's classic tale, The Little Prince, is about to land in the star-studded galaxy known as Cannes.

The Cannes Film Festival will see the premiere of the animated tribute to the French literary classic later this month.

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An international bestseller since 1943, the film version will likely introduce many young film fans to the story for the first time. It already has a huge following here in Turkey, which savvy publishers have rushed to take advantage of.

"There was great excitement among Turkish publishers" on Dec. 31, writer Kaya Genç tells me. That was the moment when the copyright on the book expired in many parts of the world.

He first noticed and blogged about the phenomenon in February.

"We had like 30 different editions in three weeks," he says. There were 3D pop-up editions as well as a scratch and sniff one and a bargain version going for the equivalent of about a toonie. 

Step into any Turkish bookstore and the selection is spilling off the shelves. That 3D version is sold out in several stores.

One reason Turks love the tale is probably because of the Turkish character early in the story. In the fourth chapter, Saint-Exupéry writes of a Turkish astronomer wearing a fez, a traditional Ottoman hat. 

Genç, though, thinks there's more to it. "My theory is that there are some parallels between Ottoman poetry…and The Little Prince. They use similar imagery — the rose, the nightingale, the garden … the lover and the beloved. We have these parallels in Ottoman poetry and I think it's in our genes in a way," he says.

Careful translation

There is yet another layer to The Little Prince that adds to the interest in the book in Turkey. One that proves everything is political here.

"There's a section of the book, which is a bit controversial, where Saint-Exupéry refers to Atatürk as a dictator," Genç points out.

It is the same section with that Turkish astronomer wearing the fez.

When the book was first published in Turkey in 1953, it was translated by Ahmet Muhip Diranas, a highly regarded poet and author in his day.

Because of a Turkish law banning insults against the country's leadership, Diranas translated the line about Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of modern-day Turkey, to call him a "great leader."

Genç says that it is "a very interesting situation" in that "Atatürk wants to change the way people dress, he wants to Westernize them. But then along comes a Western author who says this is a dictatorial thing to do." 

Subsequent translations have seen variations of that initial characterization — including a "peremptory" leader and a "strong" leader, Genç says. And now all versions are available on the shelves here.

Audiences in Canada will have to wait until later this year to see how the new film frames that famous Turkish astronomer, as well as the Turkish President who took away his fez.