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rfmcdonaldCBC's Nil Köksal had a nice article about the popularity of The Little Prince in Turkey on the eve of the film release.
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.
[. . .]
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.
