Watership Down

Published in 1972, Watership Down, by Richard Adams, is a fantasy-adventure novel for middle-grade readers and above that follows a group of rabbits as they search for a new home and defend it against enemies. Widely considered a children’s literature classic, the book is also beloved by adults for its engaging characters, action sequences, and lyrical descriptions of landscape. Its resemblance to great human sagas such as the Trojan War, the biblical Exodus, and the founding of Rome bring depth to its pages, as do the work’s allegories of freedom, courage, fairness, and respect for others.

Watership Down won the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Prize. The work has been adapted for film, television, stage, radio, and even a computer game. Adams wrote a sequel and several other bestselling novels, including The Plague Dogs and The Girl in a Swing.

The book’s Lexile ranking is 880L, accessible to fifth graders and above. The 2018 edition includes two introductory chapters and a glossary of rabbit words.

CONTENT WARNING: The story contains scenes of violence, including poisoning, gunshot wounds, and bloody combat between animals.

The ebook version of the 2018 edition forms the basis for this study guide.

Plot Summary

In a rabbit warren in southern England, Young Hazel’s brother Fiver has a terrible feeling that something bad will happen to everyone if they don’t leave. Despite being unable to read it, he’s alarmed by a sign put up by humans. The sign says that the area will soon have houses on it. Hazel brings his brother to the Chief Rabbit, the Threarah, who dismisses the young buck’s fears.

Hazel trusts Fiver’s instincts, and he begins to collect others who’ll leave with them. The warren is crowded, and many of those who join are small rabbits with little prospect of a good life there. A member of the Threarah’s Owsla guard, Bigwig, deserts and joins Hazel. Owsla captain Holly tries to arrest Bigwig but is defeated, and the group escapes.

They set off at night through dangerous woods. In the morning, they come to a small river but manage to swim across it. Hazel searches ahead and finds a field of beans where they can rest and hide. Late that night, they cross a road and enter a thick heather that slows their travel. Some rabbits want to start a new warren there, but Hazel convinces them to keep moving.

The next morning, they come upon a beautiful, lush meadow and begin digging burrows. A large, healthy rabbit visits and invites them to join his nearby warren, which is huge, has plenty of room for newcomers, and gets lots of free food from a farmer. Though friendly, the residents seem unaccountably sad. Fiver senses danger, but the other newcomers think it’s a wonderful place until Bigwig gets caught in a snare. They manage to free him and promptly leave.

The rabbits trek for two more days and arrive at last at the steep face of Watership Down. They climb to the top, where they find a stand of trees under which they begin to dig burrows.

Captain Holly appears, injured and half insane. The group brings him in, along with a second refugee, Bluebell. Holly recovers and describes the destruction of the old warren: Humans killed the rabbits with poison gas and gunshots, then plowed over the burrows.

The group continues digging new burrows and tunnels. At night, Dandelion and Bluebell tell stories of the great rabbit El-ahrairah and his exploits and tricks. One day, Hazel rescues a mouse from a hawk, and the mice return the favor by telling the rabbits of a fine place for grazing. Hazel also rescues a gull named Kehaar with a broken wing. It recuperates in the burrows and thanks them by finding, from the air, a large warren and a farm hutch, both with does for Hazel’s rabbits.

Hazel sends Holly and a team to the large, overcrowded warren. They offer to take some does but instead are arrested and forced into servitude. They trick their guards, escape, and return to Watership but without does. Meanwhile, Hazel and a small group try to free four rabbits who live in the farm hutch; they manage to liberate three, including two females. In the process, though, Hazel gets shot. The others believe he’s dead, but Fiver dreams his brother still lives, and he finds Hazel hiding in a drainpipe. Hazel recovers and announces a second expedition to Efrafa.

The group hides near the warren while Bigwig presents himself to its leader, the powerful tyrant Woundwort, and gets hired as an Owsla guard. Inside, he meets a doe, Hyzenthlay, who agrees to help him escape with several females. They make a break for it just as a tremendous thunderstorm breaks. Woundwort pursues them to a river, where the escapees board a small boat. Hazel gnaws through the dock line, and the boat floats away.

The rabbits leave the boat and begin their journey to Watership. An Efrafa patrol follows them and locates their warren. Woundwort brings squads of soldiers to retake the does, but the defenders blockade the burrow entrances while Hazel sets loose a dog from a nearby farm. It chases Blackberry and Dandelion up the hill to the Watership warren, where it promptly attacks Woundwort’s soldiers. The survivors scatter; Woundwort is never found.

The Watership warren, now at peace, thrives and produces many litters. Hazel and the Efrafans agree to start a new warren midway between them that’s filled with rabbits from both places. Hazel lives to a ripe old age, his exploits now enshrined as new stories about the rabbits’ religious icon El-ahrairah.