Publisher of racy men’s mag Maxim and sensitive poet, millionaire party-animal and self-confessed tree-hugger – Felix Dennis is a man of extremes.
Dennis became famous in the 1960s and 70s as co-editor of the controversial counter-cultural Oz magazine. He was jailed in 1971 for publishing obscene cartoons but later acquitted. Given this successful publisher has made it into our Business Pioneers hall of fame, it is somewhat amusing that the judge gave him a shorter sentence than his co-accused because he was “very much less intelligent”, and therefore less responsible.
The lengthy courtroom battle – during which he dressed outrageously and received public support from John Lennon and Yoko Ono – was the first act to a lifelong show of rebellion.
Founding his own publishing company in 1973, Dennis became a pioneer in personal computer magazines. He made millions in the 1980s by selling off his publications Personal Computer World and MacUser.
Dennis Publishing is still thriving today and boasts titles such macho titles as Auto Express, Stuff and Maxim – whose motto is “To hell with political correctness…It’s time to party!” It’s barely dressed models and locker-room humour has made it the world’s best-selling men’s lifestyle magazine and forced more ‘intellectual’ men’s mags to ‘loosen up’ to keep up.
Dennis continues to party in his luxury pads around the world, which are furnished with replete wine cellars, bronze statues of his heroes (including Muhammad Ali and Steven Hawking) a giant chessboard and leisure complex, and lots of young ladies.
After overcoming crack cocaine addiction, Dennis channeled his energy into poetry and his first collection, A Glass Half Full, was published in 2002. It has become one of the UK’s top selling books of original verse. In 2004 he read his down-to-earth poems with the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon to great acclaim. His second collection, Lone Wolf was supported with a typically boozy national tour.
Now thought to reign among the top 50 richest men in the UK, Dennis is giving a little back by planting thousands of saplings in the British countryside. He’s hoping to cover more than 20,000 acres in ‘The Forest of Dennis’ – a fitting legacy for the Robin Hood of the publishing world.
