David Attenborough, the voice of nature, turns 100
National Post, 8 May 2026
BBC's famed naturalist celebrates his centennial by narrating a new documentary about his work
A fortnight back, Britain marked the centennial of the birth of Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. This Friday marks the centennial of the birth of one of the few Britons to rival her global recognition, Sir David Attenborough.
Sir David is very much alive. Life on Earth indeed!
The BBC is celebrating its most celebrated personality, the world’s storyteller of nature, with a flowering of commemorations. Sir David, still working, is now telling the stories of his greatest stories. So prolific for so long, it seems that a century of life is too short to have accomplished all that he has.
How long has Sir David been producing and narrating the BBC’s spectacular nature programs?
It was 50 years ago that production began for Life on Earth, the series that introduced the viewing public to the man who would introduce them to the splendours of the natural world.
The landmark Blue Planet series exploring the oceans was released 25 years ago, when Sir David was a mere youth at 75. Twenty years ago, at 80, he released Planet Earth, telling the stories of mountains, and rainforests, and grasslands, as if the whole planet was one magnificent menagerie of which he was the convivial host.
April’s Artemis II mission reminded us of the power of photographs from space. The first “earthrise” shot in 1968 changed the way the Earth was seen and understood. That was the wide shot; Sir David’s programs provided the close-ups — leaves budding in time-lapse, insects scurrying back and forth, orcas devouring a walrus, rains making the desert bloom.
Both the astronauts and the BBC employed technological breakthroughs to help us see what had never been seen before. The astronauts went to space; BBC’s cameramen took the latest equipment under the seas and into the jungles, feats of photography as sublime as any painter could imagine.
It is not the pictures though that make Sir David such a marvellous companion. It is the voice. Many, perhaps most, would not know Sir David’s face at first glance. When his brother, the actor and director Lord Richard Attenborough, was cast as the elderly scientific entrepreneur in Jurassic Park, many mistakenly assumed it was David.
It is the voice that makes him instantly recognizable as an old friend, a welcome companion for a ramble in the countryside.
There are actors who are hired to provide the “voice of God” when thought necessary; Sir David’s voice is not that. His capacity to whisper at full volume is singular, and his whisperings make it seem that the rushing waterfalls and crawling tortoises are speaking directly to you. Not the voice of God, but the voice of God’s creation.
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