What examples are there proving that Saint-Exupery's The Little Prince is not just for children, but for adults as well, and exposes the reality...

The Little Prince exposes the reality
of life by exposing many social issues. Among those issues
are materialism, vanity, problems of absolute authority, conceit, and drunkenness.
Saint-Exupery argues that rather than all of these problems, what is really important in
life are the things that can't be seen, such as love and faithfulness. Below is a
discussion of a couple of the social issues Saint-Exupery
exposes.

Saint-Exupery especially exposes the issue of
materialism in the first chapter of the book through the use of the
pilot's drawing of a "boa constrictor from the outside." The fact that the adults who
viewed his picture did not have a keen enough ability to interpret minor details, but
rather saw the image as a material object, such as a hat, shows us that the problem he
is trying to expose is materialism. In addition, the pilot asserts that he is able to
discern a person's ability to reach "true understanding," an understanding of things
beyond the corporeal (Ch. 1). Materialism is especially exposed through the businessman
who can't be bothered to converse with the prince because he is "concerned with matters
of consequence" (Ch. 13). In fact, he is busy counting the stars that he considers to be
his own material objects that will make him very rich. He believes he owns the stars
because he "was the first person to think of it," as we see in his subsequent lines of
reasoning, "When you find a diamond that belongs to nobody, it is yours. When you
discover an island that belongs to nobody, it is yours" (Ch. 13).

The
social issue of vanity is expressed especially through the
prince's rose. Her vanity makes her very demanding and not at all appreciative. She
demands a screen to keep out the draft and a glass globe to protect her from the cold
night air. She torments the prince so much that he decides to leave her and his planet.
Finally, she realizes her errors and asks for his forgiveness, assuring him that she
truly loved him all the while, showing us just how dangerous vanity can
be.

Hence we see that The Little Prince deals
with many complex social issues and teaches many lessons, making it a very adult book
told in a child's voice. In addition, Saint-Exupery shows us that these social issues
are a way of life and that in rising above them we reach "true
understanding."