review (blog 19)
Posted by iupchc21 on April 23, 2008
During my first year of college this book was required for my humanities literature course. I wasn’t sure how I would like the book, but when I started reading it I was captivated by interest. I couldn’t put the book down I just wanted to keep reading it.
Watership Down started off as a book about a group of rabbits that live in a small community. In that small community there was a rabbit named Fiver, he had physic abilities and he told the head rabbit that something bad was going to happen to their community (also called a warren). The chief rabbit didn’t believe Fiver, so Fiver went and told another rabbit named Hazel about what he thought was going to happen to the warren. Hazel believed Fiver and they were both tired of no one in the warren taking Fiver’s warnings seriously.
That day Fiver and Hazel decided that they were going to leave the warren, they told a few other rabbits that if they wanted to go with they should meet that night and they would all leave together. That night the group of rabbits met to leave the warren, while they were trying to leave the warren security came to arrest them. They escaped the security and ran from the warren.
The rabbits traveled for a few days trying to find a place that would be good for them to create their own warren. Finally after a long travel they found a spot that they thought would be perfect. They started digging holes and they noticed a rabbit sitting in the field watching them. The rabbit was much larger than any of them, and didn’t seem to be worried about any danger that could possibly be in the field.
When the rabbit came over to talk to them he told them that he was sent over from a warren that was close by, and they were wondering if Hazel and the other rabbits would want to join their warren. After the rabbit left, Hazel and the other rabbits all decided that they wanted to go and check out the warren. The next day Hazel and the rabbits decided to go visit the warren and see how life was there. When they got there they were greeted by all of the rabbits, and given a tour of the warren. All of the rabbits that belonged to the warren were very large and healthy. There seemed to be no signs of problems or any dangers.
Hazel and the other rabbits decided they were going to move into the warren, they were all comfortable with their new home. Except for Fiver, for some reason Fiver just couldn’t feel save at the new warren and kept begging Hazel to leave at once. None of the other rabbits wanted to leave, they all wanted to stay, and they couldn’t understand why Fiver didn’t like it there.
Finally one day when they were out gathering food one of the rabbits, named Big Wig, was caught in a snare. Hazel and the rabbits with him all did their best and got Big Wig out of the snare, but the rabbits from the new warren acted like they didn’t know anything was happening. After that Hazel realized that the rabbits were kept safe by the humans and fed by the humans. Then when they got big enough the humans would catch the rabbits and eat them.
Hazel and his rabbits decided to leave the new warren at once and try to find a safer place to make a warren. They once again travel for a few days, then they come upon an area that is perfect for them to create their warren. They settle into the new place, when they start digging their holes they realize one major thing that they hadn’t thought about until this point. When they left their original warren they didn’t take any females with them. All of their hard work and travels would mean nothing if they didn’t have any females.
One day a few of the rabbits were wandering and they came upon a farm. That night Hazel took a few rabbits with him and went to the farm and found rabbits in hutches. He went in and talked to them and told them that he would be back for them, at a later time. A few days later they found a bird that had a broken wing. The bird was mean at first, but then it realized that the rabbits were trying to help it not hurt it. When the bird was better they asked him to fly around and see if he could find another rabbit warren.
They were hoping that the bird would find another warren that they could go and ask if they would have a few of their females. When the bird came back a few days later, he told them that he did find another warren. This warren was a two day trip for the rabbits. Hazel sent a few of the rabbits there to try to get some does. When the rabbits didn’t come back after a few days Hazel decided he would go to the farm and get the rabbits from the hutches.
Hazel retrieves the rabbits, but the farmer comes home and gets his gun when he sees the rabbits running away. Hazel gets shot and runs into a drain pipe, he tells the others to go back without him. When the others get back to the warren they find that the rabbits that had gone to the other warren asking for females were back. They listened to the story of their journey and realized it was going to be impossible to get females.
Fiver told the others that he sensed that Hazel was still alive and needed their help, but no one believed him. So that night Fiver took off to find Hazel, when he got to where Hazel was he realized that he was right, Hazel was still alive. Fiver helped Hazel back to the warren and helped him to recover from his wound. When Hazel heard what had happened to the rabbits that had gone to find females, he realized that he needed to recover and go back with them.
When Hazel became strong enough to make the journey we went with the other rabbits to the warren where they had tried to get females before. When he got there he talked to the chief rabbit, but all the chief rabbit told him was that they were now prisoners of the warren and were not aloud to leave. During their time there Hazel became friends with a few females and one night they developed a plan to escape the warren with the females and go back to their warren.
The night they were going to leave came and they all worked together and got out of the warren. The only problem a guard saw them and they were chased. They got away using some of their tricks and went back to the new warren that they had created.
Overall I have to give this book an +A it was really good!!!!
