Variations littéraires sur l'altruisme cosmique : étude comparée de la conception du bonheur dans Le Petit Prince de Saint-Exupéry et Train de nuit dans la Voie lactée de Miyazawa

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Supervisors: Goto, Kanako ; Dehoux, Amaury
Faculty: Faculté de philosophie, arts et lettres
Degree label: Master [120] en langues et lettres modernes, orientation générale
Abstract: enIn a comparative study, respecting the fundamental otherness of literary works from vastly different cultures can be a tricky task. These last years, a new theory has been developed by Professor Shunqing Cao to overcome this matter: the “variation theory”, in which focus is put on differences rather than resemblance between stories. We have decided to follow Cao’s suggested approach in our analysis of two classic pieces, Miyazawa’s “Night on the Milky way railroad” and Saint-Exupéry’s “The Little Prince”. These two works share surprising similarities in their themes, characters and settings, in spite of their important cultural gap. The following essay consists in a comparison of both works through a variational approach, in order to examine in what way their similitudes actually express distinct views, by extracting the universal, civilisational and singular dimensions of both narratives and more specifically of the vision of happiness they offer.