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Title: Watership Down
Author: Richard Adams
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 7/10
# pages: 398
Date read: February, 2007
Summary: Living in the Sandleford Warren with its Chief Rabbit and Owsla maintaining a comfortable social order, Hazel and his little brother Fiver are content enough. But Fiver has the gift of prophecy, and when he warns that the warren has to be abandoned right away or they are all going to die, Hazel and a small circle of friends believe him and leave despite the fact that have no idea where they are going. Fiver envisions a great high place where they can be happy and safe, but there are a series of imposing obstacles to overcome, from not only humans and predators, but other wild rabbits as well. Consequently the basic story of "Watership Down" is the ancient quest for home, although in this case it is a new home that represents a wild rabbit's idea of utopia. (From Amazon.com)
Review: Watership Down is a cute book, but I had difficulties loosing myself in it. Perhaps because the main characters were rabbits, so I couldn't really relate? In any case I never forgot it was a book.
It's the kind of book that makes me almost embarrassed to be a human. Especially when I read about the gassing of the original colony. What makes us think we have the right to kill animals, just because we happen to have bought the area of land that they live on? A question that has no answer I guess, but one can't help (well - *I* can't help anyway ;) ) drawing parallels to what happened to the Native Americans when Europeans first came to America, to the Aboriginals in Australia and to the Maories in New Zealand. Not too big a difference there, except to say that people are obviously able to treat other human beings like that as well, and not just animals.
I like the idea that all animals have some sort of common language. I don't know how realistic it is, but it's a nice touch. And it seems a lot more realistic that it's a foreign language for all of them, rather than that they're just able to understand each other right off the bat, as many books and movies presume.
Book List
Author: Richard Adams
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 7/10
# pages: 398
Date read: February, 2007
Summary: Living in the Sandleford Warren with its Chief Rabbit and Owsla maintaining a comfortable social order, Hazel and his little brother Fiver are content enough. But Fiver has the gift of prophecy, and when he warns that the warren has to be abandoned right away or they are all going to die, Hazel and a small circle of friends believe him and leave despite the fact that have no idea where they are going. Fiver envisions a great high place where they can be happy and safe, but there are a series of imposing obstacles to overcome, from not only humans and predators, but other wild rabbits as well. Consequently the basic story of "Watership Down" is the ancient quest for home, although in this case it is a new home that represents a wild rabbit's idea of utopia. (From Amazon.com)
Review: Watership Down is a cute book, but I had difficulties loosing myself in it. Perhaps because the main characters were rabbits, so I couldn't really relate? In any case I never forgot it was a book.
It's the kind of book that makes me almost embarrassed to be a human. Especially when I read about the gassing of the original colony. What makes us think we have the right to kill animals, just because we happen to have bought the area of land that they live on? A question that has no answer I guess, but one can't help (well - *I* can't help anyway ;) ) drawing parallels to what happened to the Native Americans when Europeans first came to America, to the Aboriginals in Australia and to the Maories in New Zealand. Not too big a difference there, except to say that people are obviously able to treat other human beings like that as well, and not just animals.
I like the idea that all animals have some sort of common language. I don't know how realistic it is, but it's a nice touch. And it seems a lot more realistic that it's a foreign language for all of them, rather than that they're just able to understand each other right off the bat, as many books and movies presume.
Book List
