It’s taken a while, but the paperback version of Walter Isaacson’s 2011 Steve Jobs biography is finally getting a release.
Publisher Simon & Schuster said over the weekend the book will hit stores on September 10, almost two years after Jobs’ death. Aimed at new readers as well as the most fanatical of fanboys who surely already have the original edition, the cover will feature a different image to that of the hardback.
The paperback version will use the photo (above left) of Jobs which inspired the original book cover – head-and-shoulders shot, thumb on chin, the ‘look’ straight down the barrel of the lens.
The picture was taken by South African photographer Norman Seeff back in 1984 when the late Apple co-founder was 29. That was the year the Macintosh computer launched, with Seeff during the same shoot also capturing an image (right) of Jobs – sitting in the lotus position with the new Apple computer – that Time magazine used on its cover to mark the death of the Apple co-founder in 2011. The same photo can be found on the back cover of Isaacson’s book.
Writing about the 1984 shoot, Seeff said, “I was beginning to build a level of intimacy with him, and then he rushed off, and came back in and plopped down in that pose. He spontaneously sat down with a Macintosh in his lap. I got the shot the first time. We did do a few more shots later on, and he even did a few yoga poses – he lifted his leg and put it over his shoulder – and I just thought we were two guys hanging out, chatting away, and enjoying the relationship.”
According to AllThingsD, the book – price currently unknown – will also be updated with a new afterword.
In a review published shortly after the biography hit stores in 2011, the New York Times’ Janet Maslin described Isaacson’s work as “an encyclopedic survey of all that Mr. Jobs accomplished, replete with the passion and excitement that it deserves.”
