David Attenborough: ‘I’m counting my blessings’
Sir David Attenborough is the stuff of legend when it comes to the natural world. Aged 91, he continues to work tirelessly to educate us through beautiful programming about the world we live in. With his new series of Natural Curiosities coming back on sc
On teaching ‘It’s the most crucial job in our society’
Hi David! So a new series of Natural Curiosities – what do you love about the programme?
It’s fun to do. And it’s a new kind of programming because they’re background stories that never get told – it’s to do with how animals were discovered. For example, I didn’t know about pizzly bears, which are a hybrid of grizzly bears and polar bears.
What else do you investigate?
How other organisms tell the time and what different creatures lay eggs, why do they lay eggs and what is it about an egg that’s important? The history of tortoises and turtles, and how the shell evolved. It’s not going hacking into the middle of the African jungle – it’s going to museums and looking at small things. It’s fun and I hope that it’s interesting and new.
You’ve been to places so many of us haven’t. What does it feel like?
I’m counting my blessings. It makes you feel like you’ve had all this luck and you haven’t taken advantage of it as you might have done. For example, I don’t take photographs any more – mainly because I’m with pals and they all take photographs. If you look at my photo archive you’ll find that I was taking photographs like mad in the 50s, 60s and 70s, but eventually, all these photographs, what are you going to do with them?
So you don’t feel like you’ve done enough?
Oh no, I think I’ve done enough – more than enough. But it’s much nicer to be doing things than not doing things. The people who might say, ‘You’ve done enough,’ are the poor souls who have to sit there and watch you on television!
Does all this talk of you being a national treasure make you feel uncomfortable?
Who says it?
Prince William said it when it was your 90th birthday! He compared you to his granny…
His granny, really? It’s just there’s a vacant space for this sort of thing and somebody has got to be put in it.
If you’d never started in this career, what do you think you’d have done?
I’d either have been a teacher or a research scientist. I enjoy teaching and have done so at various times in my life. It’s the most important and crucial job in our society, particularly teaching young children. Teachers are undervalued and don’t get the credit they should.
When you were young did you have the same natural curiosity?
Oh, as a child, yes. I was absolutely fascinated by fossils, salamanders, newts and grass snakes. And I certainly still go looking for fossils when I’m abroad. But the trouble is it’s illegal in most places!
Can you still go places without getting too much attention?
I like London’s museums, music and theatre. But you have to be careful, because although it may be irritating sometimes, these are the people who watch you. They aren’t doing it because they hate you, they like what you’re doing, so it’s ungrateful. But at the same time you could be thinking about what you’re looking at. So when people come up asking for a selfie, I say, ‘I’m not on duty at the moment,’ and they say, ‘Oh fine, thank you.’ People are very understanding.
What are your next projects?
I’ve just come back from Tennessee from an elephant sanctuary. I’m going to Trinidad this week, where I’m going to look at leatherback turtles. Then I go to Switzerland, where I’m making a programme about ants! There’s Blue Planet, too, which is sitting at a computer working out the words and getting them right.
There are rumours of a Planet Earth 3, too… Are there?
I’ll get them to pay in advance! How could they not? If they want me to do it then it’s a lovely job – of course, I’ll do it.
Do you think nature programmes will always be relevant?
Oh, hugely so. The United Nations said recently that over 50% of the world’s population are urbanised – that means to some degree half of the people in the world are out of touch with the natural world. Some may not even see a wild creature from one day to the next, unless it’s a pigeon or a mouse. And if that’s the case then they’ve lost a huge source of delight. One of the things that television can do is to replace that loss.
Do you think continuous learning and working keeps you young?
I don’t know. I’m just very grateful that I’m reasonably fit and that’s nothing to do with virtue or clean living. I just happen to be able to walk around. I’m in my nineties, and we all have friends and relatives in their nineties who can’t get out of a chair. It’s not their fault – the human frame is like a motorcar, it does run down and develop faults. Had I not had two new knees, I’d be in a chair wondering why I couldn’t go to Africa! I’m incredibly lucky.