Interpretation of The Rabbits Who Caused All the Trouble

The fable “The rabbits who caused all the trouble” written by James Thurber is about a pack of wolves who complain about the way rabbits are living near them. To be able to eat the rabbits without being threatened by the other animals living in the forest, they have a plan to ruin the rabbits’ way of living systematically. First they give absurd reasons to blame natural disasters like floods or earthquakes, in which some …

…God’. The fable is written in a very simple style. Thurber only includes a few adjectives; most of the sentences are very short, so everybody can understand the story. James Thurber does not write much about inner feelings. He only gives an impression of the plot, but not of the animals’ thoughts. Thurber used repetition to underline the most important sentences, which are for example the wolves’ justification to ‘civilize’ the rabbits (cf. ll. 5, 7, 13-14).