Watership Down

Watership Down

Watership Down is a survival and adventure novel by English author Richard Adams, published by Rex Collings Ltd of London in 1972. Set in southern England, the story features a small group of rabbits. Although they live in their natural environment, they are anthropomorphised, possessing their own culture, language, proverbs, poetry, and mythology. Evoking epic themes, the novel follows the rabbits as they escape the destruction of their warren and seek a place to establish a new home, encountering perils and temptations along the way. Watership Down was Richard Adams' first novel. Although it was rejected by several publishers before Collings accepted it, it won the annual Carnegie Medal, annual Guardian Prize, and other book awards. It was adapted into an animated feature film in 1978, and later a television series which ran from 1999 to 2001. Later, a miniseries of the story was made and aired in the UK in 2018. Adams completed a sequel almost 25 years later, Tales from Watership Down (Random House, 1996; Hutchinson and Alfred A. Knopf imprints). It is a collection of 19 short stories about El-ahrairah and the rabbits of the Watership Down warren, with "Notes on Pronunciation" and "Lapine Glossary".

Production: WARNER BROTHERS PICTURES
  1 win & 4 nominations.
 
IMDB:
7.7
Rotten Tomatoes:
82%
PG
Year:
1978
91
6,428 Views

Hazel:
Did you find anything on your flight?

Kehaar:
Efrafa.

Hazel:
Can you guide us there?

Kehaar:
Many rabbits. Too many rabbits.

Holly:
A lot of us wouldn't be enough to fight one of their wide patrols.

Bigwig:
What do you mean?

Holly:
[shows Bigwig the scar on his shoulder] You see this? They did it to me. It's an identification mark. Tells you when you can be above ground.

Bigwig:
What do you mean? Who's to stop you?

Holly:
Their Owsla. Their chief is called Woundwort. General Woundwort. I don't think even you'd match up to him, Bigwig. Under him are his captains, each one in charge of a Mark. If you're found above ground at the wrong time, they take you before the Council for punishment.

Bigwig:
Some of them must get away.

Holly:
They caught one trying to run away when I was there. Blackavar was his name. When they'd finished with him, both his ears were ripped to shreds...worse than this one of mine. He was lucky not to have been killed. There was another one, a doe, Hyzenthlay. I couldn't have escaped without her help.

Sliver:
Why didn't she go with you?

Holly:
She wouldn't go without the others.

Hazel:
Then there are some that might be persuaded to leave?

Holly:
Oh, yes. But you'd never get them out of Efrafa.

Dandelion:
Well, you got out.

Holly:
Only because Lord Frith sent one of his great messengers. [a flashback shows Holly running away from two Efrafans, the Efrafans are run over by a train and Holly rolls down a steep slope] I didn't see what happened to them. It must have cut them down.

Hazel:
Well, it's not going to be easy, but I'm afraid we don't have much choice. We'll start off as soon as I'm fit to travel.

Holly:
I don't like this idea of yours at all, Hazel.

Hazel:
Holly, I want you to stay here. You're known to them and it could be dangerous for you.

Holly:
I've been in Efrafa, and I tell you you're making a bad mistake that might very well get you all killed.


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