The fealty of Bigwig

I finally picked up and read Richard Adams’s Watership Down, despite my children’s insistence that I scarred them forever when I got the movie version for them to watch without knowing the story, only that there were pictures of cute bunnies on the cover.  

I can see their point, there being a fair amount of bunny-on-bunny violence in the story.  But the more I think about it, the more I appreciate this novel.  Bigwig, in particular (Thayli in Lapine [rabbit language]) stands as one of the great heroes of western literature.

That time we gave Maddie a One Ring planter for her birthday

The war between the Watership Down bunnies (led by Chief Rabbit Hazel) and the Efrafan bunnies (led by the ruthless General Woundwort) comes to a climax in “Bigwig Stands His Ground”:

Before he could draw back, Woundwort’s whole weight came down on [Bigwig] and the next moment his teeth had met in his right ear…

The blood ran over Bigwig’s neck and down his foreleg…

Woundwort spoke…“You’re too good to be killed. Come back to Efrafa.”…

“He wants me to come out on my feet,” he thought. “But it’s Inlé [darkness], not Efrafa, that I shall go to from here.”…

Blood had matted the great thatch of fur on his head, and one ear, half severed, hung down beside his face.  His breathing was slow and heavy…

“Thlayli…I can bring in enough rabbits to pull down this wall in four places. Why don’t you come out?” 

Thlayli’s reply, when it came, was low and gasping, but perfectly clear. 

“My Chief Rabbit has told me to defend this run and until he says otherwise I shall stay here.”

Oh Thlayli! What courage! What valor! What fuzzy fortitude! Would I stand my ground in such stout obedience to my Chief Rabbit while the blood ran down my shredded ear?

Of course no discussion of inspirational literary loyalty is complete without recognizing Sam Gamgee of Lord of the Rings.

“It is going to be very dangerous, Sam…Most likely neither of us will come back.”

“If you don’t come back, sir, then I shan’t, that’s certain,” said Sam. “Don’t you leave him! they said to me. Leave him! I said. I never mean to. I am going with him…and if any of those Black Riders try to stop him, they’ll have Sam Gamgee to reckon with.”…

“Oh, Mr. Frodo, that’s hard…trying to go without me and all.”…

“But I am going to Mordor.”

“Of course you are. And I’m coming with you.”

Maddie’s birthday present from Jeddy: a pair of guinea pig friends. This is Potato.

This is Poof.

Our well-cared for and well-dressed bunny, who has never had to fight any bunny dictators to the death.

There is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.

~Proverbs 18:24