Life Revived As Snapshot Of a New Era
「Life」雜誌復刊：新時代的定格影像
Nearly two decades after its last reincarnation folded, Life magazine is coming back to life.
上一次復刊後又停刊，算算也快20年了。《Life》雜誌即將再次出刊。
The iconic magazine, known for its red-box logo and devotion to visual storytelling, will start publishing again this month as a quarterly print magazine. It enters a fractured media landscape that is worlds away from the publication’s midcentury heights of acclaim, before the internet, social media and artificial intelligence upended the business model of magazine publishing.
這本以紅框標誌和影像敘事聞名的老牌刊物，本月將以季刊紙本重新登場。眼前的媒體環境，已和上世紀中葉的高峰期完全不同：當時網路、社群媒體和人工智慧都還沒出現，更別說改寫整個雜誌業的玩法。
But Karlie Kloss, the model and entrepreneur who is backing the project through her Bedford Media company, says the legacy of the brand deserved to be reinvigorated and brought into the 21st century. In addition to a website and a social media presence, Life plans to expand into short-form video, documentary films and events.
模特兒兼創業家卡莉・克勞斯透過旗下Bedford Media推動這項計畫。她認為這個品牌值得被重新點燃，帶進21世紀。除了網站和社群媒體，《Life》也打算做短影音、紀錄片和活動。
Life magazine was started in 1936 by Henry Luce, the founder of Time and Fortune magazines. Its first issue featured on its cover a black-and-white photograph by Margaret Bourke-White of the concrete Fort Peck Dam in Montana, part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal. It sold out instantly.
《Life》由《Time》與《Fortune》創辦人亨利・魯斯於1936年創刊。創刊號封面是瑪格麗特・伯克－懷特拍攝的蒙大拿州派克堡大壩黑白照片，那座水壩是羅斯福「新政」的工程之一。創刊號一上市就賣光。
A monument to the power of photojournalism, Life magazine documented mid-20th-century America, including World War II, the space race and the civil rights movement.
作為紀實攝影力量的象徵，《Life》記下了20世紀中葉的美國：二次大戰、太空競賽、民權運動。
The magazine’s circulation peaked in the 1960s, reaching more than 8 million copies. But as the popularity of television began to upend the magazine industry, Time Inc. stopped publishing the weekly magazine in 1972. Life restarted in 1978, this time as a monthly magazine, until 2000, when Time Inc. announced it would cease regular publication.
發行量在1960年代衝到高峰，超過800萬本。後來電視興起，雜誌業大受衝擊，時代公司於1972年停掉《Life》周刊。1978年改以月刊復刊，2000年宣布停止定期出刊。
For the last 25 years, Life has appeared either as the occasional special issue or, briefly, as a weekly supplement for newspapers.
這25年來，《Life》多半只以特刊出現，或短暫地以夾報周刊形式發行。
Kloss licensed the rights to publish Life from Dotdash Meredith, the previous name of People Inc., in 2024 and put together a team to reimagine what it could look like in the modern era.
2024年，克勞斯向People Inc.前身的Dotdash Meredith取得出版授權，並找來團隊，重新思考這本雜誌在今天該長什麼樣子。
The issue will come out Nov. 23 as a large-format, 250-page print magazine retailing for $45, combining news photography with long-form journalism.
復刊號訂於11月23日上市：大開本、250頁、定價45美元，結合紀實攝影與長篇報導。
文／Katie Robertson，譯／國際中心
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【張佑生】
曾與時代(Time)雜誌並列出版業雙峰的生活(Life)雜誌要復刊，是業界大事，紐時特別報導。Reincarnation folded用reincarnation(轉世)而非revival，暗示Life不是第一次起死回生，而是帶著前世業力的再一次輪迴；Life magazine is coming back to life.語帶雙關，令人會心一笑。
Fractured media landscape不是單純的「破碎媒體環境」，對出版人來說，原本的雜誌市場已經碎成訂閱、社群、影音、活動等互不相屬的碎片，是「支離破碎的媒體版圖」。
報導兩度出現upend，掀桌，指電視、網路、AI把「靠發行量與廣告撐起大開本」的商業邏輯假設徹底顛覆：The new regulations could upend the entire industry.而reinvigorate有「又是一尾活龍」的意思，源自invigorate，常用被動式，可理解為refreshed.
報導用a monument to the power of photojournalism形容Life，monument既是對攝影新聞力量的禮讚，也暗示那股力量已被封存成歷史遺跡。《Life》全盛期代表的是「一張照片就能定義一個時代」的媒介霸權；復刊時再用這個詞，承認紀念碑仍在，但當年的權力結構早已不在。
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