Explore Chapter 21 of 'The Little Prince' with the original English text, English translation, detailed IELTS vocabulary and explanations, and audio of the English original. Listen and improve your reading skills.
At that moment, the fox came. "Good morning," said the fox.
"Good morning," the little prince said politely, but when he turned around, he saw nothing. "I am here," the voice said, "under the apple tree."
"Who are you?" asked the little prince. He added, "You are very nice to look at." "I am a fox," said the fox.
"Come play with me," said the little prince. "I am very sad." "I can't play with you," the fox said. "I am not tamed." "Oh! I'm sorry," said the little prince. But after thinking, he added, "What does 'tame' mean?"
"You don't live here," said the fox. "What are you looking for?"
"I am looking for people," said the little prince. "What does 'tame' mean?"
"People," said the fox. "They have guns and they hunt. It is very upsetting. They also keep chickens. These are the only things they care about. Are you looking for chickens?"
"No," said the little prince. "I am looking for friends. What does 'tame' mean?" "It is something people often forget to do," said the fox. "It means to make a connection." "To make a connection?"
"That's it," said the fox. "To me, you are just a little boy like many other little boys. I don't need you. And you don't need me. To you, I am just a fox like many other foxes. But if you tame me, we will need each other. To me, you will be special in the whole world. To you, I will be special in the whole world..."
"I am starting to understand," said the little prince. "There is a flower... I think she has tamed me..."
"That could be," said the fox. "On Earth, you see all kinds of things."
"Oh, but this is not on Earth!" said the little prince.
The fox looked confused and very curious.
"Ah, that's interesting! Are there chickens?" "No."
"Nothing is perfect," sighed the fox. But he went back to his thought.
"My life is very dull," the fox said. "I hunt chickens; people hunt me. All chickens are the same, and all people are the same. So, I am a bit bored. But if you tame me, it will be like the sun shining on my life. I will know the sound of a step that is different from others. Other steps make me run back under the ground. Your step will call me, like music, out of my hole. And look: you see the wheat fields over there? I don't eat bread. Wheat is useless to me. The wheat fields mean nothing to me. And that is sad. But you have golden hair. Think how great it will be when you tame me! The wheat, which is also golden, will remind me of you. And I will love to hear the wind in the wheat..."
The fox looked at the little prince for a long time.
"Please, tame me!" he said.
"I want to, very much," the little prince said. "But I don't have much time. I have friends to find, and many things to learn."
"You only understand things that you tame," said the fox. "People have no time to understand anything. They buy things already made from shops. But there is no shop where you can buy friendship, so people have no friends anymore. If you want a friend, tame me..."
"What do I need to do to tame you?" asked the little prince.
"You need to be very patient," said the fox. "First, sit down a little away from me—like that—in the grass. I will look at you from the corner of my eye, and you say nothing. Words cause misunderstandings. But you will sit a bit closer to me every day..."
"It would be better to come back at the same time," said the fox. "For example, if you come at four in the afternoon, then at three I will start to be happy. I will get happier and happier as the time gets closer. At four, I will be excited and jumping around. I will show you how happy I am! But if you come at any time, I will never know when my heart should be ready to welcome you... You must follow the right rituals..."
"Those are also things people often forget," said the fox. "They make one day different from other days, one hour from other hours. For example, among the hunters I know, there is a ritual. Every Thursday they dance with the village girls. So Thursday is a great day for me! I can walk all the way to the vineyards. But if the hunters danced at any time, every day would be the same, and I would never have a break."
So the little prince tamed the fox. And when it was almost time for him to leave—"Ah," said the fox, "I will cry."
"It's your own fault," said the little prince. "I never meant to hurt you; but you wanted me to tame you..."
"But now you are going to cry!" said the little prince.
"It has helped me," said the fox, "because of the color of the wheat fields." Then he added, "Go and look at the roses again. Now you will see that yours is special in the whole world. Then come back to say goodbye, and I will give you a secret as a gift."
The little prince left to look at the roses again.
"You are not like my rose at all," he said. "You are nothing yet. No one has tamed you, and you have tamed no one. You are like my fox when I first met him. He was just a fox like many other foxes. But I made him my friend, and now he is special in the whole world."
And the roses were very embarrassed.
"You are beautiful, but you are empty," he continued. "No one could die for you. Sure, a normal person passing by would think my rose looks just like you—the rose that is mine. But she alone is more important than all you other roses: because I watered her; because I put her under the glass cover; because I protected her behind the screen; because for her, I killed the caterpillars (except the few we saved to become butterflies); because I listened to her when she complained, or bragged, or even when she said nothing. Because she is my rose."
And he went back to see the fox. "Goodbye," he said.
"Goodbye," said the fox. "And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: You can only see clearly with your heart; what is important cannot be seen with the eyes."
"What is important cannot be seen with the eyes," the little prince repeated, to remember it.
"The time you spent on your rose is what makes your rose so important."
"The time I spent on my rose—" said the little prince, to remember it.
"People have forgotten this truth," said the fox. "But you must not forget it. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose..."