Morris was born in Purton, Wiltshire, to Marjorie (née Hunt) and children's fiction author Harry Morris. In 1933, the Morrises moved to Swindon where Desmond developed an interest in natural history and writing. He was educated at Dauntsey's School, a boarding school in Wiltshire.[1]
Morris stayed at Oxford, researching the reproductive behaviour of birds. In 1956 he moved to London as Head of the Granada TV and Film Unit for the Zoological Society of London, and studied the picture-making abilities of apes.[1] The work included creating programmes for film and television on animal behaviour and other zoology topics. He hosted Granada TV's weekly Zoo Time programme until 1959, scripting and hosting 500 programmes, and 100 episodes of the show Life in the Animal World for BBC2.[1] In 1957 he organised an exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London, showing paintings and drawings composed by common chimpanzees. In 1958 he co-organised an exhibition, The Lost Image, which compared pictures by infants, human adults, and apes, at the Royal Festival Hall in London. In 1959 he left Zoo Time to become the Zoological Society's Curator of Mammals.[1] In 1964, he delivered the Royal Institution Christmas LectureonAnimal Behaviour. In 1967 he spent a year as executive director of the London Institute of Contemporary Arts.[1]
Morris's books include The Naked Ape: A Zoologist's Study of the Human Animal,[3] published in 1967. The book sold well enough for Morris to move to Malta in 1968 to write a sequel and other books. In 1973 he returned to Oxford to work for the ethologist Niko Tinbergen.[4] From 1973 to 1981, Morris was a Research Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford.[5] In 1979 he undertook a television series for Thames TV, The Human Race, followed in 1982 by Man Watching in Japan, The Animals Road Show in 1986 and then several other series.[1] Morris wrote and presented the BBC documentary The Human Animal and its accompanying book in 1994. National Life Stories conducted an oral history interview (C1672/16) with Morris, in 2015, for its Science and Religion collection held by the British Library.[6]
Morris's father suffered lung damage in World War I, and died when Morris was 14. He was not allowed to go to the funeral and said later; "It was the beginning of a lifelong hatred of the establishment. The church, the government and the military were all on my hate list and have remained there ever since."[8] His grandfather William Morris, an enthusiastic Victorian naturalist and founder of the Swindon local newspaper,[1] greatly influenced him during his time living in Swindon.
In July 1952, Morris married Ramona Baulch; they had one son, Jason.[1] In 1978 Morris was elected vice-chairman of Oxford United.[2] While a director of the club, he designed its ox-head badge based on a Minoan-style bull’s head, which remains in use to this day.[9]
Morris lived in the same house in North Oxford as the 19th-century lexicographer James Murray who worked on the Oxford English Dictionary.[10] He has exhibited at the Taurus Gallery in North Parade, Oxford, close to where he lived.[11] He is the patron of the Friends of Swindon Museum and Art Gallery and gave a talk to launch the charity in 1993.[12] Since the death of his wife in 2018 he has lived with his son and family in Ireland.[13]
The Big Cats (1965) – part of The Bodley Head Natural Science Picture Books, looking at the habits of the five Big Cats.[14]
The Mammals: A Guide to the Living Species (1965) – a listing of mammal genera, non-rodent non-bat species, and additional information on select species.
Men and Pandas (1966) with Ramona Morris – third volume in the Ramona and Desmond Morris animal series.
The Naked Ape: A Zoologist's Study of the Human Animal. New York: McGraw-Hill. 1967. – a look at the humanity's animalistic qualities and its similarity with other apes. In 2011, Time magazine placed it on its list of the 100 best or most influential non-fiction books written in English since 1923.[15]
Men and Snakes (1968) with Ramona Morris – an exploration of the various complex relationships between humans and snakes
The Human Zoo (1969) – a continuation of The Naked Ape, analysing human behaviour in big modern societies and their resemblance to animal behaviour in captivity.
Patterns of Reproductive Behavior (1970)
Intimate Behaviour (1971) – A study of the human side of intimate behaviour, examining how natural selection shaped human physical contact.
Manwatching: A Field Guide to Human Behaviour (1978) – includes discussion of topic "Tie Signs"
Gestures: Their Origin and Distribution (1979)
Animal Days (1979)
The Soccer Tribe (1981)
Pocket Guide to Manwatching (1982)
Inrock (1983)
Bodywatching – A Field Guide to the Human Species (1985)
Some of Morris's theories have been criticised as untestable. For instance, geneticist Adam Rutherford writes that Morris commits "the scientific sin of the 'just-so' story – speculation that sounds appealing but cannot be tested or is devoid of evidence".[16] However, this is also a criticism of adaptationism in evolutionary biology, not just of Morris.
Morris is also criticised for suggesting that gender roles have an evolutionary rather than a purely cultural background.[17]
