It's here! Browse the 2024 Penguin Christmas gift guide
The Naked Ape

The Naked Ape

A Zoologist's Study of the Human Animal

Summary

FIFTIETH ANNIVERSARY EDITION - WITH A NEW PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR

Here is the Naked Ape at his most primal - in love, at work, at war. Meet man as he really is: relative to the apes, stripped of his veneer as we see him courting, making love, sleeping, socialising, grooming, playing.

Zoologist Desmond Morris's classic takes its place alongside Darwin's Origin of the Species, presenting man not as a fallen angel, but as a risen ape, remarkable in his resilience, energy and imagination, yet an animal nonetheless, in danger of forgetting his origins. With its penetrating insights on man's beginnings, sex life, habits and our astonishing bonds to the animal kingdom, The Naked Ape is a landmark, at once provocative, compelling and timeless.

'Original, provocative and brilliantly entertaining. It's the sort of book that changes people's lives' Sunday Times

Reviews

  • Readable, surprising and provocative
    The Times

About the author

Desmond Morris

Desmond Morris was born in 1928. Educated at Birmingham and Oxford universities, he became the Curator of Mammals at London Zoo in 1959, a post he held for eight years. In 1967 he published The Naked Ape which has sold over 10 million copies worldwide and has changed the way we view our own species forever. An accomplished artist, tv presenter, film maker and writer, Desmond Morris's books have been published in over thirty-six countries.
Learn More

Sign up to the Penguin Newsletter

For the latest books, recommendations, author interviews and more