acornett99 's review for:

Watership Down by Richard Adams

4.0

adventurous dark reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: No

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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 Watership Down follows a band of rabbits who abandon their warren at the prompting of a seer-rabbit who foresees disaster, just in time for their warren to be destroyed by human development. The life of a rabbit is full of hardship, and the rabbits face many challenges on their way to the hill of Watership Down, where they will eventually make their new warren, as well as new challenges once they get there. 

This is a book well-known for traumatizing young children, who are drawn in by the promise of a cute rabbit adventure only to be hit in the face with the bloody reality of a wild rabbit’s life. As an adult reading, however, it’s not nearly as gruesome as I was led to believe. I think most of its reputation is the result of people reading it while very young. While I do think people can read this at any age, I’m glad to read it as an adult, because I don’t think I would have had the patience for its style as a kid. However, I was obsessed with Warrior Cats as a middle-schooler, which clearly took a great deal of inspiration from Watership Down. 

I had watched the 1978 film about a year ago, so I remembered most of but not all of the plot beats. The film is remarkably loyal to the plot, but the book goes a lot more in depth into the rabbits as characters. I especially appreciated the stories of El-Ahrairah, which is something that is only lightly touched on in the film. In the book, they serve to give more color to the world, act as a reprieve between tenser plot beats, and later inspire our Chief Rabbit Hazel to come up with his plan to save the warren.

Adams’ prose and style was an unexpected highlight for me as well. He describes the settings very evocatively, especially considering he is writing from a rabbit’s point of view. An early example:

 “From the moment he entered it, the wood seemed full of noises. There was the smell of damp leaves and moss, and everywhere the splash of water went whispering about. Just inside, the brook made a little fall into a pool, and the sound, enclosed among the trees, echoed as though in a cave. Roosting birds rustled overhead; the night breeze stirred the leaves; here and there a dead twig fell. And there were more sinister, unidentified sounds from further away; sounds of movement.”

Again, this is not something I would have had the patience for as a kid, especially when he spends an entire page describing the specific way moonlight reflects on the downs, but it’s something I’ve gained a deeper appreciation for as an adult. Though that moonlight one was still a bit much.

Even though Adams claims this book is not allegory (in the same way that Lord of the Rings is not allegory I’m sure), there’s a lot to be analyzed and unpacked, while still being an enjoyable read on the surface level. The epigraphs at the beginning of each chapter point to some of the inspirations Adams uses, and those alone are enough to send you down a rabbit hole (pardon my pun). One of those books where the more you put into it, the more you get out of it. Especially when it comes to the Efrafa arc and the characters fight against rabbit fascists, I refuse to believe there’s not at least some symbolism there. I’m all for Death of the Author in this instance - people have compared Woundwort to Stalin, or Hazel to Jesus Christ. Everybody seems to come to the book with a different lens, and I think all of them are fascinating, add to the story, and cast it in a new light. 

In short, it’s a classic for a reason. It seems to be written for everyone and yet no one. Though it has dark themes and a scattering of bloody scenes, it’s nowhere near as gruesome as its reputation (all the main rabbits live!) 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Animal cruelty