Deux Paris / Orly (1985)
With an estimated 145 million copies sold worldwide and translations into over 500 languages, The Little Prince is one of the most successful books ever. Considering these dazzling stats, it’s all the more remarkable that the novel’s author, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, wasn’t a full-time writer but worked as a pilot most of the time.
Saint-Exupéry played a significant role in the early years of commercial aviation, flying mail routes across Africa and South America. During World War II he served as a reconnaissance pilot for the Free French Air Force, flying high-risk missions over occupied Europe.
One of those missions led to the pilot and author’s death in 1944: After collecting intelligence on German troop movements in the Rhone Valley, Saint-Exupéry’s machine vanished under mysterious circumstances. The wreckage of his plane was not discovered until 2000, spotted by a diver off the coast of Marseille, and the cause of the crash remains unknown to this day.
Saint-Exupéry is remembered in many ways. There are various streets, squares and other pieces of infrastructure named after the author, war hero and pioneering aviator, for example at Orly Airport, whose runway 08/26 is dedicated to Saint-Exupéry. Situated south of Paris, Orly was the most important airport in France until Charles de Gaulle Airport opened in 1973.
In 1985, French minimal wave duo Deux wrote a little homage to Orly. In the beautifully naive sounding track “Paris / Orly”, the duo consisting of Cati Tête and Gérard Pelletier imagined taking off to Austerlitz, Stalingrad and Tokyo, departing from the Parisian airport that was just not that important anymore…
Start the conversation
Become a paid member of The Rest to gain access to the comments section.