Theme · Rabbits
Children's books about rabbits: three titles, and the hare apart
Few animals turn up as often in books for the very young as the rabbit, from Peter Rabbit to the bunny in Goodnight Moon. Here are three books checked with their publisher and the age given, why the rabbit works so well as a hero, and what sets it apart from its cousin, the hare.
Why rabbits
The rabbit has an advantage few animals have: many children have stroked one. It's small, soft, fits in your arms, and lives at petting farms, at grandparents' houses or in the classroom.
There's also the role. The rabbit is prey: small, quick, always on the alert. For a child who is small too and can run fast, it's an easy character to slip into. The fox or the farmer is never far away in these stories.
What we don't claim: that rabbit books offer something other animal books don't. No study looks at one species in particular. Two studies on humanised animals in general are on our page about animals.
Three rabbit and hare books, checked
A classic, a bedtime book and a book about love. The age comes from BookTrust or Common Sense Media and is named for each book.
The Tale of Peter Rabbit
Beatrix Potter · Frederick Warne, 1902 · BookTrust: interest age 3 to 6, reading age 5 to 7
The disobedient rabbit in Mr McGregor's garden, who loses his jacket and nearly more. Small format, small risk, and a warm bed at the end.
Guess How Much I Love You
Sam McBratney, illustrated by Anita Jeram · Walker Books, 1994 · BookTrust: interest age 0 to 3
Two hares, a big one and a little one, compare how much they love each other. Hares, strictly speaking: look at the long ears.
Goodnight Moon
Margaret Wise Brown, illustrated by Clement Hurd · Harper & Brothers, 1947 · Common Sense Media: age 2+
A little bunny says goodnight to everything in the room. The rabbit here is just a child in pyjamas, which is exactly the point.
Hare or rabbit, and who brings the eggs
They're two different animals with almost opposite ways of life. English, like French, has a word for each; German often calls both “Hase”.
The hare. Bigger than the rabbit, brown to reddish, with ears longer than its head and black at the tips. It lives alone all year.1 It doesn't dig a burrow: in danger, it presses itself into a shallow hollow in the ground, called a form.24 It leaps three metres long and two high, and reaches 80 kilometres an hour.2
The wild rabbit. Smaller, grey-brown, with clearly shorter ears and legs. It lives in colonies and digs its own burrows. The young are born naked, blind and toothless, and stay underground for about two weeks.3 It's the rabbit kept in hutches and homes; the hare is no pet.
What that gives you when reading. A child who asks why the rabbit in the book has a burrow and the hare in the field hides in a hollow has looked closely. Two sentences explain the difference, and your child has learnt to tell two more animals apart.
And at Easter? The Easter Bunny's first known mention in writing is in a text from 1682, De ovis paschalibus by Georg Franck von Franckenau, published in Heidelberg.5 Why a hare rather than a hen, the text doesn't say. In Ireland, the Easter Bunny owes more to popular culture than to Irish tradition; the chocolate egg hunt is the custom.6
Or a story of their own
If your child should be the hero
- Your child finds a small animal in a hollow at the edge of a field and has to work out whether it needs help or is exactly where it should be.
- A field hare and a hutch rabbit argue about which of them brings the eggs, and your child has to decide.
- Your child trains with a hare for a race and learns the zigzags it uses to shake off every pursuer.
Frequently asked questions
- What's the difference between a hare and a rabbit?
- The hare is bigger, brown to reddish, with ears longer than its head and black at the tips. It lives alone and doesn't dig a burrow: in danger, it presses itself into a hollow called a form. The wild rabbit is smaller and grey-brown, with shorter ears and legs; it lives in colonies and digs burrows, where its young are born naked and blind.
- From what age is a rabbit book good?
- Guess How Much I Love You has an interest age of 0 to 3 according to BookTrust, and Common Sense Media rates Goodnight Moon from two. BookTrust gives The Tale of Peter Rabbit an interest age of 3 to 6.
- Are the animals in Guess How Much I Love You rabbits or hares?
- Hares: Big Nutbrown Hare and Little Nutbrown Hare. Their long ears give them away.
- Where does the Easter Bunny come from?
- Its first known mention in writing dates from 1682, in De ovis paschalibus by Georg Franck von Franckenau, published in Heidelberg. Why a hare brings the eggs, the text doesn't explain; the explanations you read elsewhere are interpretations.
Sources
- 1.NABU North Rhine-Westphalia: the European hare. (in German)What it confirms: The hare's size, longer ears and brown to reddish coat; a solitary animal all year.
- 2.Deutsche Wildtier Stiftung: the European hare. (in German)What it confirms: The form as a resting place; leaps of three metres long and two high; up to 80 kilometres an hour.
- 3.NABU North Rhine-Westphalia: the wild rabbit. (in German)What it confirms: Life in colonies and dug burrows; shorter ears and legs; young born naked, blind and toothless, leaving the burrow after about two weeks.
- 4.NABU Berlin, 29 March 2021: Auch der Osterhase ist ein (Ost-)Berliner. (in German)What it confirms: Unlike the rabbit, the hare digs no burrow and presses itself to the ground in danger.
- 5.Erfurt University Library: Dem Osterhasen auf der Spur. (in German)What it confirms: The first known written mention of the Easter hare, in De ovis paschalibus by Georg Franck von Franckenau, Heidelberg, 1682.
- 6.Gifts.ie: When is Easter 2027?What it confirms: Chocolate egg hunts at Easter in Ireland; the Easter Bunny more a matter of popular culture than an Irish tradition.
Other themes: Animals, Autumn, Dinosaurs, Moles, Elephants, Witches, Unicorns and Fire engines. Read also: The bedtime routine. Or children's books by age, growing up, topic by topic and all the illustration styles.