Sisters Rosamond Mahony (left) and Juliet Johnson with Finsbury North MP Jeremy Corbyn

A book published 50 years ago was celebrated as the author’s daughters returned to their childhood home to unveil a plaque in his honour.

Richard Adams, who wrote the bestselling 1972 prizewinning novel Watership Down, was honoured on Friday as an Islington Heritage green plaque was fitted to the house in Bingham Road, Canonbury, where he lived with his family.

Mr Adams died in 2016, aged 96, and his two daughters Juliet Johnson and Rosamond Mahony were there to pay tribute to their father, recalling how he was “loud, energetic, emotional and full of information, ideas and stories”.

Ms Johnson said: “He could sometimes be overenthusiastic: I remember feeling horribly embarrassed when he insisted on reciting poetry to me and a visiting schoolfriend. But in spite of that he was great fun.”

Juliet Johnson and Rosamond Mahony with their father, Richard Adams

Describing the importance of the plaque to them, she added: “The day was something we had been planning and dreaming about but it’s almost like completion for me. It’s setting the seal on something that’s been a part of our lives for so long.

“I’m a historian so it means a lot to me. It’s important to me that when people walk past the house, that once upon a time there were two ­little girls who were told a very amazing story and against all the odds were able to get it out there for the world to read.”

The story – and the subsequent film featuring the Art Garfunkel hit song Bright Eyes – chronicles the lives of a group of ­rabbits who are forced to leave their burrow after developers take over their land and build houses on it. It is famous for being a tear-jerker among readers and viewers of all ages.

The book was initially rejected by several large publishing firms before being taken on by a small one-man publisher, Rex Collings, with an initial print run of just 1,500. It took a further six months before more books could be printed to meet a demand, although the sisters say it was a “slow burn” that allowed their father time to get used to his success.

The plaque

Describing how the book “captured the imagination” of the world, Ms Mahony said they used to receive “sackloads of fan mail” from young and old because at its heart the book was neither a book for children nor adults.

“I think it was a very good adventure story,” she added. “The plot line moves fast and it captures the imagination and takes you into a whole new world of rabbits, which is completely different, and the language is completely different from anything you’ve read before.”

The sisters said the unveiling of the plaque was the final ending of the Watership Down chapter in their lives – but that returning to the home they lived in as a family for more than 20 years had brought them back into contact with faces from their childhood.

“As I came up Bingham Street I thought: ‘I wonder if something’s happened’ and then I realised they were all there for us,” said Ms Johnson. “It was wonderful to see so many faces from the past who actually knew Daddy.”

The unveiling of the plaque in Bingham Street