Sumi Shimamoto

Princess Sarah, also known as Little Princess Sara, is a 1985 Japanese anime series produced by Nippon Animation and Aniplex, based on Frances Hodgson Burnett’s novel, A Little Princess. Spanning 46 episodes, it originally premiered in 1985 across Japan on Fuji Television as the 11th series of Nippon Animation’s famous World Masterpiece Theater staple.

It was also later aired across Japan by the anime television network, Animax, who also later broadcast the series across its respective networks worldwide, including its English language networks in Southeast Asia and South Asia, dubbing and translating the series into English under the title Princess Sarah. Animax’s adaptation was the series’ only English translation, and the series has yet to be commercially released in the United States. The series has also been selected as one of the best 100 Japanese anime series of all time by viewers of TV Asahi.

It was also aired in numerous countries worldwide and translated into several languages, including French, Italian, German, Arabic, Filipino and Spanish. In the Philippines, it was aired by ABS-CBN in the early 1990s, and was a runaway success, even spawning a live-action film and a TV series. In the Pan-Arab region, it became the most successful anime based on a novel adaptation in the 90s with small variation in which the main character name is Sally instead of Sara.