Ephemerality
In the Mezzanine, the passage Howie reads from his Penguin classic describes life as trivial or ephemeral. The word ephemeral in French is “éphémère”. In the book Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince), this word is used to describe flowers. The Little Prince visits the planet of a geographer. The geographer asks the Little Prince to describe his planet for his geography book. When the Little Prince describes his home, he mentions his rose. The geographer says that he doesn’t write about flowers because they are ephemeral. The Little Prince asks what this means, and the geography says it means that his flower is won’t last forever, that his flower is going to disappear. This upsets the Little Prince because he realizes that his flower is going to disappear, and he left her all alone. Later on, he is on Earth and comes upon a garden of roses. He realizes that his rose isn't unique. This makes him sad because he thought his rose was important, but because she’s just an ordinary rose, t...