add site
services
publishers
database
health videos
toolbar
stats
live show
health store
more stuff
JOIN/LOGIN
| advertise add site services publishers database health videos
| | about toolbar stats live show health store more stuff JOIN/LOGIN |
Anatomie Physiotherapy Plus - Email Attenborough anatomie.co.uk | Great Smiles Dental Spa: Solihull Dentists, ABIGAIL ATTENBOROUGH greatsmiles.co.uk | Dr David L Kramer MD | Dr David A Bomback MD | Spine Surgeons | Danbury ctneckandback.com |
Sir David Frederick Attenborough (pronounced /ˈætənb(ə)rə/) OM, CH, CVO, CBE, FRS, FZS, FSA (born 8 May 1926 in London, England) is a broadcaster and naturalist. His career as the respected face and voice of natural history programmes has endured for more than 50 years. He is best known for writing and presenting the nine "Life" series, in conjunction with the BBC Natural History Unit, which collectively form a comprehensive survey of all life on the planet. He is also a former senior manager at the BBC, having served as controller of BBC Two and director of programming for BBC Television in the 1960s and 1970s. He is the younger brother of director, producer and actor Richard Attenborough.
[edit] Early and family lifeAttenborough grew up in College House on the campus of University College, Leicester, where his father, Frederick, was principal.[1] He is the middle of three sons (his elder brother, Richard, became an actor/film director and his younger brother, John Michael Attenborough, an executive at Alfa Romeo).[2] During World War II his parents also adopted two Jewish refugee girls from Europe. Attenborough spent his childhood collecting fossils, stones and other natural specimens. He received encouragement in this pursuit at age seven, when a young Jacquetta Hawkes admired his "museum". A few years later, one of his adoptive sisters gave him a piece of amber filled with prehistoric creatures; some 50 years later, it would be the focus of his programme The Amber Time Machine. Attenborough was educated at Wyggeston Grammar School for Boys in Leicester and then won a scholarship to Clare College, Cambridge in 1945 where he studied geology and zoology and obtained a degree in Natural Sciences.[3] In 1947, he was called up for National Service in the Royal Navy and spent two years stationed in North Wales and the Firth of Forth. In 1950, Attenborough married Jane Elizabeth Ebsworth Oriel; the marriage lasted until her death in 1997. The couple had two children, Robert and Susan. His son, Dr Robert Attenborough, is a senior lecturer in Bioanthropology for the School of Archaeology and Anthropology at the Australian National University in Canberra.[4] [edit] First years at the BBCAfter leaving the Navy, Attenborough took a position editing children's science textbooks for a publishing company. He soon became disillusioned with the work, however, and in 1950 he applied for a job as a radio talks producer with the BBC. Although he was rejected for this job, his CV later attracted the interest of Mary Adams, head of the Talks (factual broadcasting) department of the BBC's fledgling television service. Attenborough, like most Britons at that time, did not own a television, and he had seen only one programme in his life.[5] However, he accepted Adams' offer of a three-month training course, and in 1952 he joined the BBC full time. Initially discouraged from appearing on camera because Adams thought his teeth were too big,[6] he became a producer for the Talks Department, which handled all non-fiction broadcasts. His early projects included the quiz show Animal, Vegetable, Mineral? and Song Hunter, a series about folk music presented by Alan Lomax. Attenborough's association with natural history programmes began when he produced and presented the three-part series The Pattern of Animals. The studio-bound programme featured animals from London Zoo, with the naturalist Sir Julian Huxley discussing their use of camouflage, aposematism and courtship displays. Through this programme, Attenborough met Jack Lester, the curator of the zoo's reptile house, and they decided to make a series about an animal-collecting expedition. The result was Zoo Quest, first broadcast in 1954, which Attenborough presented at short notice, due to Lester being taken ill. In 1957, the BBC Natural History Unit was formally established in Bristol. Attenborough was asked to join it, but declined, not wishing to move from London where he and his young family were settled. Instead he formed his own department, the Travel and Exploration Unit,[7] which allowed him to continue to front the Zoo Quest programmes as well as produce other documentaries, notably the Travellers’ Tales and Adventure series. In the early 1960s, Attenborough resigned from the permanent staff of the BBC to study for a postgraduate degree in social anthropology at the London School of Economics, interleaving his study with further filming.[8] However, he accepted an invitation to return to the BBC as Controller of BBC Two before he could finish the degree. [edit] BBC administrationFrom 1965 to 1969 Attenborough was Controller of BBC Two. Among the programmes he commissioned during this time were Match of the Day, Civilisation, The Ascent of Man, The Likely Lads, Man Alive, Masterclass, Whicker's World, The Old Grey Whistle Test and The Money Programme. He also initiated televised snooker. This diversity of programme types reflects Attenborough's belief that BBC Two's output should be as varied as possible. In 1967, under his watch, BBC Two became the first television channel in the United Kingdom to broadcast in colour. From 1969 to 1972 he was BBC Television's Director of Programmes (making him responsible overall for both BBC One and BBC Two), but ultimately turned down an offer of promotion that would have made him Director General of the BBC. In the year 1972 Attenborough resigned his post and returned to being a programme maker. [edit] Major seriesForemost among Attenborough's TV documentary work as writer and presenter is the "Life" series, which begins with the trilogy: Life on Earth (1979), The Living Planet (1984) and The Trials of Life (1990). These examine the world's organisms from the viewpoints of taxonomy, ecology and stages of life respectively. They were followed by more specialised surveys: Life in the Freezer (about Antarctica; 1993), The Private Life of Plants (1995), The Life of Birds (1998), The Life of Mammals (2002), Life in the Undergrowth (2005) and Life in Cold Blood (2008). The "Life" series as a whole comprises 79 programmes. Attenborough has also written and/or presented other shorter productions. One of the first after his return to programme-making was The Tribal Eye (1975), which enabled him to expand on his interest in tribal art. Others include The First Eden (1987), about man's relationship with the natural habitats of the Mediterranean, and Lost Worlds, Vanished Lives (1989), which demonstrated Attenborough's passion for discovering fossils. In 2000, State of the Planet examined the environmental crisis that threatens the ecology of the Earth. The naturalist also narrated two other significant series: The Blue Planet (2001) and Planet Earth (2006) (which in its American cable television edition was narrated by actress Sigourney Weaver). The latter is the first natural history series to be made entirely in high-definition. In May–June 2006, the BBC broadcast a major two-part environmental documentary as part of its "Climate Chaos" season of programmes on global warming. In Are We Changing Planet Earth? and Can We Save Planet Earth?, Attenborough investigated the subject and put forward some potential solutions. He returned to the locations of some of his past productions and discovered the effect that climate change has had on them. These two programmes were released on DVD under the title The Truth About Climate Change on 23 June 2008.[9] In 2007, Attenborough presented "Sharing Planet Earth", the first programme in a series of documentaries entitled Saving Planet Earth. Again he used footage from his previous series to illustrate the impact that mankind has had on the planet. "Sharing Planet Earth" was broadcast on 24 June 2007.[10] Life in Cold Blood is Attenborough's last major series. In an interview to promote it, he stated:
However, in subsequent interviews with Radio Times, Parkinson and on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross, he said that he did not intend to retire completely and would probably continue to make occasional one-off programmes.[11] His next documentary, Charles Darwin and the Tree of Life (examining the development of Darwin's theory of evolution), was broadcast on 1 February 2009.[12] Attenborough's work as narrator also continued with Nature's Great Events, a six-part series transmitted from 11 February 2009,[13] and the ten-part Life from 12 October 2009. Both were transmitted on BBC One and BBC HD. Attenborough also narrates the forthcoming The Frozen Planet, billed as a sequel to Planet Earth and made by the same production team.[14] Although Attenborough's documentaries have attained immense popularity in the United States, several have never been made available on DVD in NTSC format, most notably those that cast doubt upon conservative religious or political positions. These include:
[edit] Other workIn 1975, the naturalist presented a BBC children's series about cryptozoology entitled Fabulous Animals.[15] This represented a diversion from Attenborough's usual fare, as it dealt with the creatures of myths and legends, such as the griffin and kraken. It was a studio-based production, with the presenter describing his subjects with the aid of large, ornately illustrated books. From 1983, Attenborough worked on two environmentally-themed musicals with the WWF and writers Peter Rose and Anne Conlon. Yanomamo was the first, about the Amazon rainforest, and the second, Ocean World, premiered at the Royal Festival Hall in 1991. They were both narrated by Attenborough on their national tour, and recorded on to audio cassette. Ocean World was also filmed for Channel 4 and later released. Between 1977 and 2005, Attenborough also narrated over 250 editions of the half-hour BBC One nature series Wildlife on One[16] (BBC Two repeats were retitled Wildlife on Two). Though his role was mainly to narrate other people's films, he did occasionally appear in front of the camera. In 1990, he highlighted the case of Mahjoub Sharif as part of the BBC's Prisoners of Conscience series.[17] In January 2009, the BBC commissioned Attenborough to provide a series of 20 ten-minute monologues covering the history of nature. Entitled David Attenborough's Life Stories, they are broadcast on Radio 4 in the Friday night slot vacated by Alastair Cooke's Letter from America.[18] Part of Radio 4's A Point of View strand, the talks are also available as podcasts.[19] He appeared in the 2009 Children's Prom at the BBC Promenade Concerts and in the Last Night of the Proms on 12 September 2009, playing a floor polisher in Sir Malcolm Arnold's "A Grand, Grand Overture" (after which he was "shot" by Rory Bremner, who was playing the gun). Attenborough also serves on the advisory board of BBC Wildlife magazine. [edit] Achievements, awards and recognition
On 13 July 2006, Attenborough, along with his brother Richard, were awarded the titles of Distinguished Honorary Fellows of the University of Leicester "in recognition of a record of continuing distinguished service to the University."[23] David Attenborough was previously awarded an Honorary Doctor of Letters degree by the university in 1970.[24] In 1993, after discovering that the Mesozoic reptile Plesiosaurus conybeari had not, in fact, been a true plesiosaur, the paleontologist Robert Bakker renamed the species Attenborosaurus conybeari in Attenborough's honour.[25] Out of four extant species of echidna, one is named after him: Sir David's Long-beaked Echidna, Zaglossus attenboroughi, which inhabits the Cyclops mountains in the Papua province of New Guinea. In June 2004, Attenborough and Sir Peter Scott were jointly profiled in the second of a three-part BBC Two series, The Way We Went Wild, about television wildlife presenters. Part three also featured Attenborough extensively. The next month, another BBC Two programme, Attenborough the Controller, recalled his time as Director of Programmes for BBC Two. In November 2005, London's Natural History Museum announced a fundraising campaign to build a communications centre in Attenborough's honour. The museum opened the Attenborough Studio, part of its Darwin Centre phase two development, in September 2009.[26] An opinion poll of 4,900 Britons conducted by Reader's Digest in 2006 showed Attenborough to be the most trusted celebrity in Britain.[27] In a list compiled by the magazine New Statesman in 2006, he was voted tenth in the list of "Heroes of our time".[28] It is often suggested that David Attenborough's 50-year career at the BBC making natural history documentaries and travelling extensively throughout the world has probably made him the most travelled person on Earth.[29] His contribution to broadcasting was recognised by the 60-minute documentary Life on Air, transmitted in 2002 to tie in with the publication of Attenborough's similarly titled autobiography. For the programme, the naturalist was interviewed at his home by his friend Michael Palin. Attenborough's reminiscences are interspersed with memorable clips from his series, with contributions from his brother Richard as well as professional colleagues. Life on Air is available on DVD as part of Attenborough in Paradise and Other Personal Voyages. In May 2008, the oldest known prehistoric mother — a fossilised fish giving live birth, was given the name Materpiscis attenboroughi. It honoured David Attenborough's role in highlighting the scientific importance of the ancient fossilised Gogo Reef, Western Australia, in his 1979 Life on Earth TV series.[30] Attenborough received three honorary degrees in 2008; one from the University of Aberdeen on 1 July 2008, another from the University of Exeter on 11 July 2008 and the other on 4 November 2008 from Kingston University.[31][32][33] A species of the Pitcher plant from Palawan Island in the Philippines, discovered in 2007 and dedicated to Attenborough on the occasion of his 80th birthday, but only officially described in 2009 is named Nepenthes attenboroughii in his honour.[34] [edit] Favourite Attenborough momentsIn April 2006, to celebrate Attenborough's 80th birthday, the public were asked to vote on their favourite of his television moments, out of twenty candidates. The results were announced on UKTV on 7 May. Each is given with its series and advocate:
[edit] Parodies and artistic portrayalsAttenborough's accent and hushed, excited delivery have been the subject of frequent parodies by comedians, most notably Spike Milligan, Marty Feldman and The Goodies. Attenborough is portrayed by Michael Palin in the final episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus, where he searches the African jungle for the legendary Walking Tree of Dahomey (Quercus Nicholas Parsonus), sweating excessively and accompanied by native guides wearing saxophones. David Attenborough has also been parodied in a series of GEICO insurance commercials, showing a nature show host, clearly patterned on Attenborough, attempting to observe the Geico Gecko and obtain footage, but failing to do so. "'E's giving me the 'eebie-jeebies," the lizard confides. "Time Flies", a sketch by David Ives, features a pair of anthropomorphic mayflies engaging in a courtship ritual, while watching themselves on television in a documentary narrated by David Attenborough.[35] He has also been parodied by the Australia 1980s sketch show The Comedy Company where Ian McFadyen portrays a character called David Rabbitborough. Discworld (video game), based on the series of books by Terry Pratchett, parodies his unique delivery to explain different aspects of Discworld Universe, such as L-Space. [edit] Views and advocacy[edit] Environmental causesFrom the beginning, Attenborough's major series have included some content regarding the impact of human society on the natural world. The last episode of The Living Planet, for example, focuses almost entirely on humans' destruction of the environment and ways that it could be stopped or reversed. Despite this, his programmes have been criticised for not making their environmental message more explicit. Some environmentalists feel that programmes like Attenborough's give a false picture of idyllic wilderness and do not do enough to acknowledge that such areas are increasingly encroached upon by humans.[36] However, his closing message from State of the Planet was forthright:
In the last few years, Attenborough has become increasingly vocal in support of environmental causes. In 2005 and 2006 he backed a BirdLife International project to stop the killing of albatross by longline fishing boats.[37] He gave public support to WWF's campaign to have 220,000 square kilometres of Borneo's rainforest designated a protected area.[38] He also serves as a vice-president of BTCV, Fauna and Flora International, president of Butterfly Conservation and president of Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust. In 2003 he launched an appeal to create a rainforest reserve in Ecuador in memory of Christopher Parsons OBE, the producer of Life on Earth and a personal friend, who had died the previous year. Attenborough also launched ARKive in May 2003,[39] a global project which had been instigated by Christopher Parsons to gather together natural history media into a digital library, an online Noah's Ark. He later became Patron of the World Land Trust, and an active supporter. He supported Glyndebourne in their successful application to obtain planning permission for wind turbine in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and gave evidence at the planning inquiry arguing that the public must be prepared to accept the visual effects of something designed to combat climate change. Attenborough has repeatedly said that he considers human overpopulation to be the root cause of many environmental problems. Both his series The Life of Mammals and the accompanying book end with a plea for humans to curb population growth so that other species will not be crowded out. In 2009, he became a patron of the Optimum Population Trust, a UK charity advocating sustainable human populations. He has recently written and spoken publicly about the fact that, despite past scepticism, he now believes the Earth's climate is warming in a way that is cause for concern, and that this can likely be attributed to human activity.[40] At the climax of the aforementioned "Climate Chaos" documentaries, the naturalist gives this summing up of his findings:
In a 2005 interview with BBC Wildlife magazine, Attenborough said he considered George W. Bush to be the era's top "environmental villain". In 2007, he further elaborated on the USA's consumption of energy in relation to its population. When asked if he thought America to be "the villain of the piece", he responded:
[edit] Religion and creationismIn a December 2005 interview with Simon Mayo on BBC Radio Five Live, Attenborough stated that he considers himself an agnostic.[41] When asked whether his observation of the natural world has given him faith in a creator, he generally responds with some version of this story:
He has explained that he feels the evidence all over the planet clearly shows evolution to be the best way to explain the diversity of life, and that "as far as I'm concerned, if there is a supreme being then he chose organic evolution as a way of bringing into existence the natural world." In a BBC Four interview with Mark Lawson, Attenborough was asked if he at any time had any religious faith. He replied simply, "No." However, he specifically denies that he is an atheist, but rather an agnostic.[43] In 2002, Attenborough joined an effort by leading clerics and scientists to oppose the inclusion of creationism in the curriculum of UK state-funded independent schools which receive private sponsorship, such as the Emmanuel Schools Foundation.[44] In 2009, Attenborough stated that the Book of Genesis, by saying that the world was there for people to dominate, had taught generations that they can "dominate" the environment, and that this has resulted in the devastation of vast areas of the environment.[45] Attenborough further explained to the science journal Nature, "That's why Darwinism, and the fact of evolution, is of great importance, because it is that attitude which has led to the devastation of so much, and we are in the situation that we are in."[46] Also in early 2009, the BBC broadcast an Attenborough one-hour special, Charles Darwin and the Tree of Life. In reference to the programme, Attenborough stated that "People write to me that evolution is only a theory. Well, it is not a theory. Evolution is as solid a historical fact as you could conceive. Evidence from every quarter. What is a theory is whether natural selection is the mechanism and the only mechanism. That is a theory. But the historical reality that dinosaurs led to birds and mammals produced whales, that's not theory."[47] He strongly opposes creationism and its offshoot "intelligent design", saying that a survey that found a quarter of science teachers in state schools believe that creationism should be taught alongside evolution in science lessons was "really terrible".[47] In March 2009 Attenborough appeared on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross. Attenborough stated that he felt evolution did not rule out the existence of a God and accepted the title of agnostic saying, "My view is: I don't know one way or the other but I don't think that evolution is against a belief in God."[48] [edit] The BBC and public service broadcastingAttenborough is a lifelong supporter of the BBC, Public broadcasting and the Television licence. He has said:
Attenborough expressed regret at some of the changes made to the BBC in the 1990s by Director-General John Birt, who introduced an internal market at the corporation, slimmed and even closed some departments and outsourced much of the corporation’s output to private production companies, in line with the Broadcasting Act 1990. He has said:
In 2008 he criticised the BBC’s television schedules:
In 2009 Attenborough commented on the general state of British television, describing the newly introduced product placement on commercial television as something he considered an “appalling” idea 20 years earlier:
[edit] Other causesIn May 2005, Attenborough was appointed as patron of the UK's Blood Pressure Association, which provides information and support to people with hypertension.[56] Attenborough is also an honorary member of BSES Expeditions, a youth development charity that operates challenging scientific research expeditions to remote wilderness environments. [edit] FilmographyMain article: David Attenborough filmography Attenborough is known foremost for writing and presenting the nine Life series, which are presented in chronological order below:
His voice is synonymous with wildlife documentaries for British audiences, and the principal series with which his narration is associated include:
[edit] Books[edit] Bibliography
[edit] IntroductionsAttenborough has written the introduction or foreword for a number of books, including:
[edit] Audio recordings
In addition, Attenborough has recorded some of his own works in audiobook form, including Life on Earth, Zoo Quest for a Dragon and his autobiography Life on Air: Memoirs of a Broadcaster. [edit] Styles and honours
[edit] References
[edit] External links
Categories: English television personalities | English conservationists | English environmentalists | English agnostics | BBC Two controllers | British Book Awards | Alumni of Clare College, Cambridge | Alumni of University College London | People associated with the University of Leicester | Commanders of the Order of the British Empire | Commanders of the Royal Victorian Order | Members of the Order of the Companions of Honour | Members of the Order of Merit | Fellows of the Royal Society | Fellows of the Zoological Society of London | Kalinga Prize recipients | People from Leicester | People from London | Knights Bachelor | 1926 births | Living people | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| ↑ top of page ↑ | about thumbshots |
