Read for the Books to Movie Reading Challenge.
Watership Down follows the journey of a few male rabbits from the warren where they were born, as they set out to found a new warren, following the lead of two brothers.
I have to say, I’m not sure how it is that I haven’t read this book before. My boyfriend was absolutely appalled that I had not read/seen this movie. It took at quick look at the Amazon reviews for me to see how popular it is. I was vaguely aware of it, but it was nothing that had ever crossed my mind to read.
This is an extremely interesting, well-written book. It’s in interesting commentary on the building of a society, and a triumph of world-building (says the fantasy/scifi geek). The entire universe of these rabbits, with their view of how they see the world, and the pretty convincing mythology built around it must have taken an incredible amount of research and thought. The author’s careful attention to rabbit behavior made the book that much more enjoyable (says the zoology major). I also really liked the way he sprinkled in rabbit vocabulary, as if you knew exactly what it was right off the bat, and I actually found I could understand most of it with no trouble whatsoever.
I’m actually surprised it took me a solid week to get through this book. I can tell I’ve had a busy week, because I think I would have finished this book in about two days if I’d been able.
I’ve added this movie to our Netflix list. My boyfriend had made the comment that the movie was definitely less gritty (for lack of a better word) than the novel, so I’m interested to see how that works.