Lost Ladies of Lit

Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry—The Tale of the Rose with Sara Kippur

Amy Helmes & Kim Askew Episode 294

Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.

0:00 | 42:14

Send us Fan Mail

Though her high-flying literary husband took center-stage, Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry was more than just the metaphorical “rose” in his novella The Little Prince. She was a writer and artist in her own right, with a gift for storytelling that’s evidenced in the now out-of-print novel Oppède. Following her death, an undiscovered memoir she wrote about her marriage to Antoine de Saint-Exupéry surfaced among her belongings and was published to great acclaim in 2000 as The Tale of the Rose. Wellesley professor Sara Kippur joins us in conversation to discuss the glittering life and literary merits of this often-overlooked 20th-century figure.

Mentioned in this episode

The Tale of the Rose: The Love Story Behind The Little Prince by Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry

Oppède or Kingdom of the Rocks by Consuelo de Saint-Exupéry

New York Nouveau: How Postwar French Literature Became American by Sara Kippur

The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

José Vasconcelos

Enrique Gomez Carrillo

Nelly de Vogüé

Alain Vircondelet

José Martines Fructuoso

Lost Ladies of Lit Episode No. 117 on Zelda Fitzgerald

André Gide

André Breton

Oppède

Website with photos of Consuelo’s art

Varian Fry

Elsa Triolet

Tropisms by Nathalie Sarraute

The Sea Wall by Marguerite Duras

The Volcano Daughters by Gina Maria Balibrera




Support the show

For episodes and show notes, visit: 

LostLadiesofLit.com

Subscribe to our
substack newsletter.

Follow us on instagram @lostladiesoflit

Email us: Contact — Lost Ladies of Lit Podcast