Oz Number 3

Oz was a satirical humour magazine first published between 1963–69 in Sydney, Australia and, in its second and more famous incarnation, from 1967 to 1973 in London, England. Strongly identified as part of the underground press, it was the subject of two celebrated obscenity trials, one in Australia in 1964 and the other in the UK in 1971. On both occasions the magazine's editors were acquitted on appeal after initially being found guilty and sentenced to harsh jail terms. Image File history File links This is a magazine cover. ... Sydney Harbour looking south from the vicinity of the Sydney Harbour Bridge towards the CBD skyline; the Opera House is visible in the background on the left. ... The clock tower of the Palace of Westminster, which contains Big Ben London is the capital city of the United Kingdom and of England. ... Royal motto: Dieu et mon droit (French: God and my right) Englands location within the UK Official language English de facto Capital London de facto Largest city London Area - Total Ranked 1st UK 130,395 km² Population - Total (mid-2004) - Density Ranked 1st UK 50. ... The phrase underground press, especially underground newspapers (or simply underground papers) is, these days, most often used in reference to the alternative print media, independently published and distributed, associated with the countercultural movements of the late 1960s and early 1970s. ... Obscenity has several connotations. ... 1964 was a leap year starting on Wednesday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1971 is a common year starting on Friday (click for link to calendar). ... This article is about the legal term. ...

The UK trial is widely regarded as the start of the backlash in the UK against the cultural values of the permissive sixties. Oz has been parodied in the short-lived television series Hippies.

The central editor throughout the magazine's life was Richard Neville. Co-editors of the Sydney version were Richard Walsh and Martin Sharp. Co-editors of the London version were Jim Anderson and, later, Felix Dennis. Richard Neville can be: Richard Neville, 16th Earl of Warwick, also known as Warwick the Kingmaker, a English noble who fought in the Wars of the Roses. ... Martin Sharp (born 1944) is an Australian artist, cartoonist, songwriter and film-maker. ... Felix Dennis is a British magazine publisher. ...

Oz in Australia

The original Australian editorial team included university students Neville, Walsh, Sharp and Peter Grose, with early contributions by future Time magazine critic and art historian Robert Hughes. Neville, Walsh and Sharp had each been involved in student papers at their respective Sydney tertiary campuses. (Clockwise from upper left) Time magazine covers from May 7, 1945; July 25, 1969; December 31, 1999; September 14, 2001; and April 21, 2003. ... Robert Studley Forrest Hughes (born July 28, 1938), usually known simply as Robert Hughes, OA is an Australian art critic, writer, documentary broadcaster and republican (anti-monarchist). ...

Influenced by the New Statesman, Private Eye and the radical comedy of Lenny Bruce, Neville and friends decided to found a "magazine of dissent". The first edition, published on April Fool's Day 1963, caused a sensation; it parodied The Sydney Morning Herald (and was even printed on The Herald's own presses, adding to its credibility). The first edition led with a front-page hoax about the collapse of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. In succeeding issues (and its its later London version) Oz also gave pioneering coverage to contentious issues such as censorship, homosexuality, abortion, police brutality, the Australian government's racist White Australia Policy and Australia's involvement in the Vietnam War, as well as regularly satirising public figures, up to and including Australian Prime Minister Robert Menzies. The New Statesman is a left-of-centre political weekly published in London. ... Private Eye is a fortnightly British satirical magazine-newspaper. ... Lenny Bruce being searched by a policeman Lenny Bruce (October 13, 1925 – August 3, 1966), born Leonard Alfred Schneider, was a controversial American stand-up comedian and satirist of the 1950s and 1960s. ... April Fools Day or All Fools Day, though not a holiday in its own right, is a notable day celebrated in many countries on April 1. ... The Sydney Morning Herald is a prestigious and important newspaper in Australia, published daily in Sydney, the most populous city in Australia. ... The Sydney Harbour Bridge is one of the major landmarks of Sydney, Australia, connecting the Sydney central business district (CBD) with the North Shore commercial and residential areas, both of which are located on Sydney Harbour. ... Censorship is the use of governmental power to control speech and other forms of human expression. ... Since its coining, the term homosexuality has acquired multiple meanings. ... Police brutality is a term used to describe the excessive use of physical force, assault, and verbal attacks and threats by police officers. ... A black man drinks out of a water fountain designated for black people in 1939 at a streetcar terminal. ... This badge from 1906 shows the use of the expression White Australia at that time The White Australia Policy was the common designation given to the official policy of all governments and all mainstream political parties in Australia based on excluding non-white people from immigrating to the Australian continent... The Vietnam War or Second Indochina War was a conflict between the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (DRVN, or North Vietnam), allied with the National Liberation Front (NLF, or Viet Cong) against the Republic of Vietnam (RVN, or South Vietnam), and their allies—notably the United States military in support of... Rt Hon Sir Robert Menzies KT AK CH QC The Right Honourable Sir Robert Gordon Menzies KT, AK, CH, QC (20 December 1894 – 14 May 1978), Australian politician, was the twelfth and longest-serving Prime Minister of Australia serving eighteen and a half years. ...

Two items in these early issues proved especially controversial. One was a satirical poem by Martin Sharp, about Sydney's youth sub-culture, entitled "The Word Flashed Around The Arms"; the other was the famous Issue #6 cover photograph, which depicted Neville and others pretending to urinate into a wall fountain (created by sculptor Tom Bass) which was mounted in the street facade of the Sydney offices of the P&O shipping line and which had recently been unveiled by Prime Minster Menzies. The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company or P&O is a shipping line which started in 1840 after the Peninsular Steam Navigation Company won the British Admiralty contract to carry the mail overseas in 1837. ...

Within six issues, the magazine had landed its editors in court on obscenity charges. The cases stemmed from a number of published items, particularly the pissoir cover and Sharp's poem. In their initial trial, all three men were found guilty, but the convictions were turned over on appeal.

Sharp and Neville left for London soon after the trial, while Walsh returned to his studies, although he subsequently revived and published a reduced edition of Sydney Oz, which ran until 1969. In the 1970s he edited POL magazine and the Nation Review and later became managing director of leading Australian media company Australian Consolidated Press, owned by Kerry Packer. Australian Consolidated Press (ACP), a member of Publishing and Broadcasting Ltd. ... Kerry Packer Kerry Francis Bullmore Packer (born 17 December 1937) is an Australian publishing, media and gaming tycoon. ...

Oz in the UK

Oz Number 28: the Schoolkids Issue

In late 1966 Neville and Sharp moved to the UK and in early 1967, with fellow Australian Jim Anderson, they founded the London Oz. Contributors included Germaine Greer, artist and filmmaker Philippe Mora, photographer Robert Whitaker, journalist Lillian Roxon, Angelo Quattrocchi and David Widgery. Image File history File links This is a magazine cover. ... Dr. Germaine Greer, pictured in her middle age Germaine Greer (born January 29, 1939) is an Australian academic, writer, and broadcaster, who is widely regarded as one of the most significant feminist voices of the 20th century. ... Philippe Mora (born 1949) is a French-born Australian film director. ... Lillian Roxon (1932-1973) was a noted Australian journalist and author. ... David Widgery (1947-1992) was a Marxist writer, journalist, physician, and activist. ...

With access to new print stocks, including metallic foils, new fluorescent inks and the greater flexibility of layout offered by the offset printing system, Sharp's artistic skills came to the fore and Oz quickly won renown as one of the most visually exciting publications of its time. Many editions of Oz included dazzling psychedelic wrap-around or pull-out posters by Sharp, London design duo Hapshash & The Coloured Coat and others; these instantly became sought-after collectors' items and now command high prices. The all-graphic "Magic Theatre" edition (Oz #16), overseen by Sharp and Mora, has been described by British author Jonathon Green as "arguably the greatest achievement of the entire British underground press." During this period Sharp also created two famous psychedelic album covers for the group Cream, Disraeli Gears and Wheels Of Fire. The Offset Printing process Offset printing is a widely used printing technique where the inked image is transferred (or offset) first to a rubber blanket, then to the printing surface. ... Cream album cover Cream was a seminal 1960s rock band which featured the guitarist Eric Clapton, bassist Jack Bruce, and drummer Ginger Baker. ...

Sharp gradually drifted away from the magazine during 1968, so a young Londoner, Felix Dennis, who had been selling issues on the street, was eventually brought in as Neville and Anderson's new partner. The magazine regularly enraged the British Establishment with a range of left-field stories including heavy critical coverage of the Vietnam War and the anti-war movement, discussions of drugs, sex and alternative lifestyles, and contentious political stories, such as the magazine's revelations about the torture of citizens under the rule of the military junta in Greece.

In 1970, reacting to criticism that Oz had lost touch with youth, the editors invited a group of secondary school students (including Charles Shaar Murray and Deyan Sudjic) to create a special 'youth' edition: Oz #28 (May 1970), known as "Schoolkids OZ". Charles Shaar Murray is an English music journalist. ... Schoolkids OZ was Issue 28 of the OZ magazine, famous for being the subject of a high-profile obscenity case in the United Kingdom in June 1971. ...

One of the resulting articles was a highly sexualised Rupert Bear parody. It was created by 15-year-old schoolboy Vivian Berger by pasting the head of Rupert onto the lead character of an X-rated satirical cartoon by Robert Crumb. The majority of the contributors were from public schools (in the UK sense of the term: elite non-state schools); as a result the humour was mostly an extension of the type of material familiar from undergraduate Rag Mags. Illustration of Rupert by Mary Tourtel Rupert Bear is a cartoon character created by Mary Tourtel in the 1920s. ... Robert Crumb (born August 30, 1943 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is an artist and illustrator who signs his work R. Crumb. Crumb was one of the founders of the underground comics movement, and is often regarded as the most prominent figure in that movement. ... A public school, in current English, Welsh and Northern Ireland usage, is a (usually) prestigious independent school, for children usually between the ages of 11 or 13 and 18, which charges fees and is not financed by the state. ...

Oz was one of several 'underground' publications targeted by the Obscene Publications Squad, and their offices had already been raided on several occasions, but the conjunction of schoolchildren and arguably obscene material set the scene for the infamous Oz obscenity trial of 1971. In some respects it was a copy of the Australian trial, with evidence and judicial instruction clearly aimed at securing a conviction, but the British trial was given an far more dangerous twist because the prosecution employed an archaic charge against Neville, Dennis and Anderson—"conspiracy to corrupt public morals"—which, in theory, carried a virtually unlimited penalty. Conspiracy, in common usage, is the act of working in secret to obtain some goal, usually understood with negative connotations. ...

The trial, which began in June 1971, brought the magazine to the attention of a far wider public than would have been the case had it simply been ignored. John Lennon and Yoko Ono joined the protest march against the prosecution and organised the recording of "God Save Oz" by the Elastic Oz Band, released on Apple Records, to raise funds and gain publicity. John Lennon in the autumn of 1968 John Winston Lennon (a. ... Yoko Ono. ... Apple Records logo, featuring a Granny Smith apple. ...

Dennis and Anderson were defended by lawyer and playwright John Mortimer (creator of the Rumpole Of The Bailey series) with assistance from Australian lawyer Geoffrey Robertson, while Neville represented himself. Sir John Clifford Mortimer (born 21 April 1923) is an English barrister turned prolific writer and dramatist. ... Rumpole of the Bailey is a television series created and written by British writer John Mortimer, QC and starring Leo McKern as Horace Rumpole, an ageing London barrister who defends any and all clients. ...

The trial was, at the time, the longest obscenity trial in British legal history. Defence witnesses included comedian Marty Feldman, artist and drugs activist Caroline Coon, DJ John Peel, musician and writer George Melly and academic Edward De Bono. At the conclusion of the trial the "Oz Three" were found guilty and sentenced to hard labour — although Dennis was given a lesser sentence because the judge, Justice Michael Argyle, considered that Dennis was "very much less intelligent" than Neville and Anderson. Shortly after the verdicts were handed down they were taken to prison and their heads shaved, an act which caused an even greater stir on top of the already considerable outcry surrounding the trial and verdict. Actor Marty Feldman in Young Frankenstein (1974) Marty Feldman (July 8, 1933–December 2, 1982). ... John Robert Parker Ravenscroft, OBE (30 August 1939 – 25 October 2004), known professionally as John Peel, was a British disc jockey and radio presenter. ... George Melly (born: 17 August 1926 in Liverpool, England) is a British jazz and blues singer. ... Edward De Bono (born 1933) is a Maltese psychologist, physician and writer. ... His Honour Michael Argyle QC MC (31 August 1915 - 4 January 1999) was a judge at the Central Criminal Court of the United Kingdom from 1970 to 1988. ...

The most famous images of the trial come from the committal hearing, at which Neville, Dennis and Anderson all appeared wearing rented schoolgirl costumes.

At the appeal trial, where the defendants appeared wearing long wigs, it was found that Justice Argyle had grossly misdirected the jury on numerous occasions. During the appeal, it was also alleged that Berger, who was called as a prosecution witness, had been harassed and assaulted by police. The convictions were overturned. Years later, Felix Dennis told author Jonathan Green that on the night before the appeal was heard, the Oz editors were taken to a secret meeting with the Chief Justice, Lord Widgery, who told them that they would be acquitted if they agreed to give up work on Oz, and that MPs Tony Benn and Michael Foot had interceded on their behalf. John Passmore Widgery, Baron Widgery (July 24, 1911 - July 26, 1981) was a British Judge who served as Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales from 1971 to 1980. ... Tony Benn about to join March 2005 anti-war demo in London The Right Honourable Anthony Neil Wedgwood Benn (born April 3, 1925), known as Tony Benn, formerly 2nd Viscount Stansgate, is a British politician regarded as being on the left of the Labour Party. ... The Right Honourable Michael Mackintosh Foot (born 23 July 1913), British politician, was leader of the Labour Party from 1980 to 1983. ...

After the UK trial

The magazine continued in publication with diminishing success until 1973; arguably, it lost much of its impact after the trial.

Dennis was stung by personal comments made by the trial judge that he was of limited ability and a dupe of the other defendants; since that time, he has become one of Britain's wealthiest and most prominent publishers, publisher of Maxim, and other magazines, and in 2004 released a book of original poetry. A 2004 cover of Maxim (US) magazine, featuring Josie Maran The cover of the first American issue of Maxim magazine, featuring Christa Miller Maxim is an international mens magazine that is prominent for depicting popular actresses, singers, and other female celebrities in sexually alluring poses, usually wearing lingerie or... 2004(MMIV) is a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Neville eventually returned to Australia, where he has become a successful author, commentator and public speaker. His books include a critically praised account in the 1980s of the life of French/Vietnamese serial killer Charles Sobraj, who preyed on Western tourists travelling on Asia's so-called "hippie trail" in the 1970s; the book was later adapted for a successful TV mini-series starring Art Malik. He also wrote a memoir of Oz magazine, Hippie Hippie Shake. // Events and trends The 1980s marked an abrupt shift towards more conservative lifestyles after the momentous cultural revolutions which took place in the 60s and 70s and the definition of the AIDS virus in 1981. ... Serial killers are individuals who have a history of multiple slayings of victims who were usually unknown to them beforehand. ... Charles Sobhraj in France. ... The hippie trail is a term used to describe the journeys taken by hippies in the 1960s and 70s from Europe to Asia (or vice versa - many were Australasians). ... Art Malik (born as Athar Ul-Haque Malik on November 13, 1952) is a Pakistani-born actor raised in England from age 11. ...

Walsh became a magazine editor with Kerry Packer's Consolidated Press organisation and eventually rose to become its senior publisher. Kerry Packer Kerry Francis Bullmore Packer (born 17 December 1937) is an Australian publishing, media and gaming tycoon. ...

Sharp has long been regarded as Australia's leading pop artist and is well known in Australia for his passionate interest in Sydney's Luna Park and in the life and music of Tiny Tim. Pop art was an artistic movement that emerged in the late 1950s in England and the United States. ... Luna Park is a historical amusement park in Sydney, Australia, first opened in 1935. ... Tiny Tim Herbert Khaury (April 12, 1932 – November 30, 1996), better known by the stage name Tiny Tim, was an American singer and ukulele player. ...

External links

Oz Number 7

• "Oz Trial lifted lid on Porn Squad bribery"
• The Rupert Bear Controversy
• Oz magazine covers
• Oz magazine covers
• Oz magazine full issues online in a readable library, plus forum
• Bill Elliot and the Elastic Oz Band: benefit single for Oz at the time of its UK obscenity trial; John Lennon and Yoko Ono credited as songwriters and producers

Image File history File links This is a magazine cover. ... John Lennon in the autumn of 1968 John Winston Lennon (a. ... Yoko Ono. ...

References

• Green, Jonathon, All Dressed Up: The Sixties and the Counterculture. Pimlico, London, 1999, ISBN 0712665234.
• Neville, Richard, Hippie Hippie Shake. William Heinemann Australia, Melbourne, 1995, ISBN 085615230

Further reading

• Nigel Fountain Underground: The London Alternative Press 1966-74, Commedia/Routledge 1988 ISBN 0415007275 / ISBN 0415007283 (pb)
• Tony Palmer The Trials of Oz, Blond & Briggs, 1971.
• Geoffrey Robertson The Justice Game, Vintage, London, 1999, ISBN 0099581914.