Brigid Brophy was a novelist, critic and polemicist whose fiction and essays reflected her interests in sexuality, art, opera, animal rights and social reform.
Brigid Brophy
Hackenfeller's Ape
1953. Allison and Busby, 1979.
Radiant and full-leafed, the Park was alive with the murmuring vibration of the species which made it its preserve. The creatures, putting off timidity at the same time as winter drabness, abounded now with no ascertainable purpose except to sun themselves
It's not Homo Sapiens, though, that interests Professor Darrelhyde: he's studying a rare species of ape in Regent's Park Zoo, whose characteristics 'came closer to the human model than those of any other animal'. The book is mostly taken up with the professor's scientific observations; after a night-time break-in there are unexpected consequences. Meanwhile the creatures in the park go about their usual business:
In the central meadow they were playing cricket. Westward, the shouts and splashes of the boating lake lingered, like gentle explosions, above the expanse of shallow water. North-west, the canal stood black and transparent like indian ink, between canals mottled by sun...