Watership Down

Watership Down

Hardcover - UK - First edition.

Author Richard Adams Published 1972-11-?? Type Fiction Genre Adventure Themes Adventure, Animals, Farm, Politics, War Age Group Teen

Watership Down is a novel written by Richard Adams for older children and published in November, 1972. It is the first book in the Watership Down series and was followed up by Tales from Watership Down.

The book opens on a warren of rabbits, one of whom, upon seeing that men have erected a large sign near their underground burrow, has a vision of their home being destroyed. He convinces several of his friends to leave their warren to go into the wilderness to find a place safely away from men to start their new home. The book details their dangerous journey, and, after starting their new warren, their even more dangerous task of defending it.

Personal

Own?	No.
Read?	Audiobook read by Peter Capaldi.
Finished	2024-11-21.

Knowing it was a classic, I had been curious to read this book for many years, but I kept putting it off. I also didn't want to see the animated adaption until I read the book, so I didn't watch that either. When I found an audiobook, I saw that it was 17 hours long, which seemed far too big for a children's book, but I decided to read it anyway because I thought it might have been the book my mother started reading to me when I was a kid. After starting it, I discovered it wasn't, but I kept at it anyway.

Review

Overall:

Good

• The author does a great job at creating an intricate rabbit world. It's full of stories about their myths and religion, and there is a rabbit language (Lapine) for concepts that are specific and important to rabbits.
• I like the Rudyard Kipling approach to anthropomorphism: the rabbits are smart and can talk to each other, but they can't do anything a rabbit can't physically do. This is unlike Beatrix Potter's approach where they wear clothes and use technology.
• The book has some good messages like anti-corruption, anti-authoritarianism, the importance of making friends with people who are different, etc. which are especially important for children to learn.
• The grizzly telling of the destruction of the original warren is gruesome and a good way to remind the reader just how evil humans can be to animals.
• The rabbit story about the dog, and all the insults they kept using to mock dogs, was quite funny.

Bad

• Lemmings do not drown themselves, but the book repeats the myth.
• While I didn't mind the chapter with Lucy caring for Hazel, it was very late in the book to suddenly switch to a human's perspective. It didn't fit with the theme, and I would have preferred it written from the rabbit's perspective.
• I didn't care for the addition of magical divination. I wouldn't have minded if the rabbits simply called their stranger-than-human intuition magic, and some were better at it than others, but Fiver has supernatural abilities on par with mythical oracles, which doesn't fit with the otherwise entirely natural setting.

Ugly

• There is a bigoted comment against the Irish.
• Although female rabbits are occasionally mentioned, and a couple even have names, pretty much every meaningful character in the book is male. They almost exclusively serve as damsels in distress without much volition of their own, and as a harem for the regimented warren.
• Despite all the action and adventure, I found the book to be quite dull and very padded out. The rabbit stories were very long and not all that beneficial to the story. If the book were a quarter the size, I would probably like it more.

Media

Covers

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  Hardcover - UK - 1st edition.

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  Hardcover - USA - 1st edition.

Representation

Strong female character?	Fail	There are only a couple named females, and they rarely talk.
Bechdel test?	Fail	It is only ever implied that the females talk to each other.
Strong person of color character?	Fail	The race of the few humans is not mentioned, but, considering their location, it can be assumed they're white.
Queer character?	Fail	There are no queer characters.

Adaptions

The novel was adapted into an animated film in 1978, a television series in 1999, and an animated series in 2018. It has been adapted to stage in 2006 and again in 2011. It was made into audio dramas in 2002, 2016, and 2018. At least seven audio book recordings have been made. It was adapted into a graphic novel in 2023.

Links