Summary of the novel - Wind, Sand and Stars · 1939
He was fond of everything he saw. Exupery always valued friendship, she was for him a yardstick of sincerity, considered the most precious her feeling that there is on the planet. His adult life was full of dramatic circumstances. He was often on the verge of death: severe permanent air disasters, participated in the struggle of the Spanish Republicans: "He did not shrink from any risk. Always ahead! Always ready for anything! "- said about him friends. But in his work, his letters, manuscripts and novels, this man revealed himself most fully. In the life of Antoine, there were two great passions, which almost simultaneously entered into his life: aviation and literature.
The book is written in the first person. Exupery dedicated it to one of his fellow pilots - Henri Guillaume.
Exupery began to work on the Toulouse-Dakar line in 1926. Experienced pilots kept somewhat alienated, but in their jerky tales a fabulous world of mountain ranges arose with traps, dips and whirls. The "old people" skillfully supported the worship, which only increased when one of them did not return from the flight. And then came the turn of Exupery: at night he went to the airfield in an old bus and, like many of his comrades, felt the birth of a ruler in him - the man responsible for the Spanish and African mail. The officials next to each other talked about illnesses, money, small household chores - these people voluntarily entered the prison of philistine prosperity, and a musician, poet or astronomer would never wake up in their hardened souls. Another thing the pilot, who will enter into a dispute with a thunderstorm, mountains and the ocean - no one regretted his choice, although for many, this bus was the last earthly shelter.
Out of his comrades, Exupery singles out first of all Mermoz, one of the founders of the French airline Casablanca - Dakar and the discoverer of the South American line. The Mermoz "conducted reconnaissance" for others and, mastering the Andes, handed over this site to Guillaume, and he took up the domestication of the night. He conquered the sands, mountains and the sea, which, in turn, more than once absorbed it - but he always got out of captivity. And after twelve years of work, during the next voyage across the South Atlantic, he briefly reported that he was turning off the right rear engine. All radio stations from Paris to Buenos Aires stood on a dreary watch, but more news from Mermoz was not. Pochev at the bottom of the ocean, he completed the work of his life.
No one can replace the dead. And the greatest happiness is experienced by pilots, when suddenly someone who has already mentally buried is suddenly resurrected. This happened with Guillaume, who disappeared during a voyage over the Andes. For five days the comrades unsuccessfully searched for him, and there was no longer any doubt that he had perished, either in the fall or in the cold. But Guillaume created a miracle of his own salvation, passing through the snow and ice. He said later that he had borne something that no animal could have tolerated - there is nothing more noble than these words that show the measure of the greatness of man, determining his true place in nature.
The pilot thinks in terms of the scale of the universe and re-reads the story in a new way. Civilization is just a fragile gilding. People forget that under their feet there is no deep layer of earth. An insignificant pond, surrounded by houses and trees, is prone to tidal action. Under a thin layer of grass and flowers, amazing transformations take place - only thanks to the aircraft they can sometimes be discerned. Another magical property of the aircraft is that it transfers the pilot to the heart of the miraculous. With Exupery it happened in Argentina. He landed on some field, not suspecting that he would enter a fairy-tale house and meet two young fairies who were friends with wild herbs and snakes. These princess savages lived in harmony with the universe. What happened to them? The transition from the girlhood to the state of a married woman is fraught with fatal mistakes - perhaps some fool has already led the princess into slavery.
In the desert, such meetings are impossible - here pilots become prisoners of the sand. The presence of the rebels made the Sahara even more hostile. Exupery knew the burden of the desert from the first voyage; when his plane crashed near a small fort in West Africa, the old sergeant received the pilots as messengers of the sky - he cried when they heard their voices.
But in the same way, the unruly Arabs of the desert were shocked, visiting France they did not know. If the rain suddenly falls in the Sahara, a great migration begins - entire tribes go three hundred leagues to find the grass. And in Savoy, precious moisture gushed, as if from a leaky cistern. And the old leaders said later that the French god is much more generous to the French than the god of the Arabs to the Arabs. Many barbarians have wavered in their faith and almost submitted to outsiders, but among them there are still those who suddenly rebel to regain their former greatness - a fallen warrior who has become a shepherd can not forget how his heart beat at the night fire. Exupery remembers talking with one of these nomads - this person did not defend freedom (in the desert everyone is free) and not wealth (in the desert there are none), but his secret world. The Arabs themselves were admired by the French captain Bonnafus, who boldly raided nomads. His existence was adorned with sands, for there is no greater joy than the murder of such a magnificent enemy. When Bonnafus left for France, the desert seemed to have lost one of its poles. But the Arabs continued to believe that he would return for the lost sense of valor - if this happens, the rebellious tribes will receive the message on the first night. Then the soldiers silently lead the camels to the well, prepare a supply of barley and check the gates, and then perform a campaign led by a strange feeling of hatred-love.
A sense of dignity can be found even by a slave, if he has not lost his memory. All the slaves of the Arabs were given the name of Bark, but one of them remembered that he was called Mohammed and he was a driver of cattle in Marrakech. In the end, Exupery managed to redeem it. At first, Bark did not know what to do with his freedom. The old negro was awakened by the smile of the child - he felt his importance on the ground, spending almost all the money for gifts to children. His guide decided that he was mad with joy. And they just owned the need to become a man among people.
Now there are no recalcitrant tribes left. The sands lost their secret. But the experience will never be forgotten. Once Exupery managed to get down to the very heart of the desert - it happened in 1935, when his plane crashed into the ground near the borders of Libya. Together with the mechanic Prevost, he spent three endless days among the sands. Sahara almost killed them: they suffered from thirst and loneliness, their reason wilted under the weight of mirages. Almost half-dead pilot told himself that he regretted nothing: he had the best share, for he left the city with his bookkeepers and returned to peasant truth. No danger attracted him - he loved and loves life.
The pilots saved the Bedouin, who seemed to them an all-powerful deity. But the truth is difficult to understand, even when you come into contact with it. At a time of higher desperation, a person finds peace of mind - probably, it was learned by Bonnafus and Guillaume. Anyone can wake up from a mental hibernation - this requires a case, favorable soil or the imperious dictates of religion. On the Madrid front, Exupery met the sergeant, who was once a small bookkeeper in Barcelona - time called for him, and he went into the army, feeling his vocation in it. There is a truth in hatred of war, but do not rush to condemn those who fight, for the truth of man is what makes him a man. In a world that has become a desert, man yearns to find comrades-those with whom the common goal binds. You can become happy only if you realize your even modest role. In the wagons of the third class, Exupery saw the Polish workers evicted from France. The whole people were returning to their sorrows and poverty. These people looked like ugly clods of clay - so pressed their lives. But the face of the sleeping child was beautiful: he looked like a fairy-tale prince, Mozart's baby, doomed to follow his parents through the same stamping press. These people did not suffer at all: they were tormented by Exupery, aware that Mozart might have been killed in everyone. Only the Spirit turns clay into a man.