Watership Down Themes

Throughout the book Watership Down there are many themes spanning the entire book, but three main themes stand out. These themes are home, leadership, and nature. The idea of home comes up again and again as the rabbits are trying to find a new home going place to place running from danger as well as finding what appeared to be a home only to find out its true horrors. Leadership is also another big theme as it shifts between the rabbits in the group as well as being stressed in the different warren they come across with varying levels of how it's enforced. Finally, there is a theme of nature. Throughout the book there is a constant battle of natural verses unnatural, the battle of prey and predator, and how rabbits should be in the

First, there is the theme of the home, which is shown as the rabbits search from place to place looking for a warren to call their own. They are forced to leave their home due to Fiver and his visions about the danger coming to the warren. Second, they find the warren of snares and leave after finding out its terrible secret. Third, they find the abandoned honeycomb which they dig out to make their own and fit their needs. Forth, they find the warren Efrafa which is not much of a home at all and is more of a prison so the rabbits return to the honeycomb. Finally, the rabbits are forced to protect their home from the Efrafrans who attack to reclaim what was stolen from them. The next theme in the book is the theme of leadership. In the book there are a few different kinds of leaders. First, there is Hazel, Hazel is a good natural leader who takes everyone's opinions into consideration when making a plan to make everyone happy. Next there is Cowslip. Cowslip is a leader who knows what is going on in his warren and knows the his rabbits will die not matter what he tried to do so he lets his rabbits die. Then there is Woundwort. Woundwort is a dictator like ruler who only cares for his wellbeing and his pursuit of power. He rules all of his rabbits with his power and does not let anyone do anything they wish making them all very unhappy. The final theme is nature. In the book there is the battle of nature and human development, with the human expanding into Fiver’s original warren. Next there is the battle of predator and prey, the rabbits are always on the run or fighting predators like cats and foxes. All of these themes can be found in the entire book with many different