Let's Bust a Recap : Watership Down

Watership Down was the last book I read in 2022, and it was a fun one to end the year. It wasn't on my 2022 book list, but I was determined to read it after seeing Sheree's post over at Keeping Up With the Penguins which informed me it would be turning 50. My copy had been sitting on my shelf for a couple years, but hadn't made it onto my book lists so I loosely slated it for November (which is the month it was originally published in 1972) and ended up reading it in December. (I also made this my choice for my book club, but I think I was the only one who read it. Holidays are a hard time to be reading a book for book club. I get it.)

Watership Down came from a story that English author Richard Adams made up on a road trip to entertain his daughters. After complaining about a particularly poor book he was reading aloud to them and emphatically stating he could do better, his daughter laid down the gauntlet saying, "Well, I only wish you would, Daddy, instead of keeping on talking about it." Challenge accepted. After a somewhat rocky road to get published, Watership Down rocketed to success and has become a rather popular enduring work. A modern classic I'd say.

And I thoroughly enjoyed it.

In the story, we follow along with rabbit brothers Hazel and Fiver as they decide they must leave their warren because of some unknown impending danger (Fiver's got the second sight, it seems), and undertake a journey to find a new safe place to start their own warren. Naturally, they try to warn their Chief Rabbit, but he's having none of it and only a few other rabbits decide to take the risk with them and leave. What follows is one close call after another as these bunnies set off to make a new home for themselves. It turns out, shortly after they left their warren, it was razed by evil humans and only two rabbits escaped with their lives. When they finally find a place to build their new warren, they realize if its ever going to be a success, they're going to need to find some female rabbits to do what bunnies do and keep their warren alive and well, so they set off on yet another dangerous mission to find them some honeys. 

Despite seemingly every reader's attempt to cull a deeper meaning out of Watership Down, Adams has insisted that he never meant for it to be some sort of allegory or parable. In his words, "it is simply the story about rabbits made up and told in the car." How Mark Twain-ish of him. This (anti)defense of his hit novel is in an introduction written by him in one of my editions of the book. So having read that, I took Adams at his word and just read it as an adventure story, and I loved it. Interestingly, both my parents remember being assigned this book in school at which time it would have been a brand new release, and listening to their teachers go on ad nauseam about all the themes and symbolism and what-not. Personally, my main takeaway is that it's cruel and unusual to keep rabbits as pets. 

However you decide to approach it, I'd say Watership Down is one worth giving a read at some point in your life. (And if you do read it: don't miss the Lapine Glossary in the back of the book to interpret the unfamiliar rabbit words!) It was exciting and entertaining, and it kept me turning the pages (despite taking nearly the entire month of December to read because World Cup and then Christmas). I could see myself picking it up again one day, and as far as I'm concerned: that's a good book.

Have you read Watership Down?