Renowned zoologist and Zoo Time TV star Desmond Morris dies aged 98

Television icon, author, and natural history expert Desmond Morris has died at the age of 98.

He was perhaps best known for his book The Naked Ape and the television programme Zoo Time, which he hosted from 1956 to 1967.

He scripted and hosted 500 programs for the pioneering show, as well as 100 episodes of the show Life in the Animal World for the BBC.

Zoo Time was an institution in the 50s and 60s, creating several famous, much-discussed moments, such as when Morris was toppled by a giant tortoise or urinated on by a lion.

At another point, a lethal cobra escaped live on-air.

The icon died in Ireland this week, where he had lived since the passing of his wife, Ramona, in 2018.

Ahead of his time in many ways, Morris’ work reflected his philosophy that human beings are members of the animal kingdom as much as any other creature, and that we are inextricably enmeshed within the natural world.

He often succinctly captured this idea with the phrase: ‘Man is a risen ape and not a fallen angel.’

Born in Wiltshire in 1928, Morris joined the British Army in 1946 before studying zoology at university, eventually earning a doctorate in animal behaviour at Oxford University.

He soon became a respected academic, and in 1956 Morris was appointed head of the Granada Television and Film Unit at the Zoological Society of London.

He used this newfound power to curate an exhibition of paintings by chimpanzees at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in 1957, provoking much ridicule but also publicity, particularly when Pablo Picasso bought one of the primates’ artworks.

Morris published his first book The Biology of Art in 1963, around the same time he began presenting Zoo Time.

But it was the publication of The Naked Ape in 1967 that made Morris a star, with the book – which looks at humans as a species and compares them to other animals – becoming a massive bestseller.

The Human Zoo, a follow-up book by Morris that examined the behaviour of people in cities, was published in 1969.

Throughout his life, Morris was a great lover of art, and painted thousands of canvasses himself, most in the surrealist style.

Morris told The Sunday Telegraph when he was approaching 70: ‘I would like to be remembered as someone who kept his childlike curiosity throughout his entire life. I describe myself as a senile child. That about sums me up.’

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