[이희원 기자] CNN의 전 최고 경영자이자 타임즈 전 편집장인 월터 아이작슨이 집필한 스티브 잡스의 자서전 "Steve Jobs" (Simon & Schuster)가 24일(현시시각) 전 세계 20여 개국에서 동시 출간됐다. 저자는 잡스의 일대기를 그와의 40차례가 넘는 만남을 통해 인터뷰와 주변인물 탐문 등의 자세한 취재를 바탕으로 실리콘밸리에서 보낸 잡스의 어린 시절부터 세계를 뒤흔들어 놓은 애플의 창업자 잡스의 천재적인 사고와 인생 여정이 담겨있다. 오는 11월 발간 예정이었던 자서전은 지난 5일 잡스가 갑작스럽게 사망하면서 출간이 앞당겨졌고 책에는 그가 자신의 터틀넥과 청바지와 관련한 에피소드, 불교 사상에 심취했던 일상, 채식주의에 대한 믿음과 초기 애플 창업 당시부터 성장사, 아이폰과 아이패드 등 탄생 비화, 경영 비법, 픽사로 재기, 아이폰 CEO로 다시 들어오기까지의 그의 열정이 모두 녹아있다. 한편, 미국의 세계 최대 온라인 서점인 ‘아마존’ 베스트셀러 집계에서는 잡스의 자서전이 돌풍을 일으키고 있으며 국내 서점 역시 민음사를 통해 초판 10만부를 인쇄 후 물량 부족으로 추가 8만부를 더 인쇄할 예정으로 잡스의 자서전은 출간과 동시에 빠르게 팔리고 있다. 아이작슨이 집필한 이번 잡스의 자서전은 유고 전 잡스가 공식적으로 인정한 유일한 자서전이기도 하다. "Steve Jobs" (Simon & Schuster), by Walter Isaacson: "Steve Jobs" takes off the rose-colored glasses that often follow an icon's untimely death and instead offers something far more valuable: The chronicle of a complex, brash genius who was crazy enough to think he could change the world — and did. Through unprecedented access to Jobs with more than 40 conversations, including long sessions sitting in the Apple co-founder's living room, walks around his childhood neighborhood and visits to his company's secretive headquarters, Isaacson takes the reader on a journey that few have had the opportunity to experience. The book is the first, and with his Oct. 5 death at age 56, the only authorized biography of the famously private Jobs and by extension, the equally secretive Apple Inc. Through Apple, Jobs helped usher in the personal computer era when he put the Macintosh in the hands of regular people. He changed the course of the music, computer animation and mobile phone industries, and touched countless others with the iPod, the iPhone and the iPad, Pixar and iTunes. His biography, therefore, serves as a chronicle of Silicon Valley, of late 20th- and early 21st-century technology, and of American innovation at its best. For the generation that's grown up in a world where computers are the norm, smartphones feel like fifth limbs and music comes from the Internet rather than record and CD stores, "Steve Jobs" is must-read history. Caption The book "Steve Jobs," by Walter Isaacson is on display at a book shop in Menlo Park, Calif., Monday, Oct. 24, 2011. The depths of Jobs' antipathy toward Google leaps out of Walter Isaacson's authorized biography of Apple's co-founder. The book goes on sale Monday, less than three weeks after Jobs' long battle with pancreatic cancer culminated in his Oct. 5 death. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma) Caption Copies of the book "Steve Jobs," by Walter Isaacson are piled high at a book shop in Menlo Park, Calif., Monday, Oct. 24, 2011. The depths of Jobs' antipathy toward Google leaps out of Walter Isaacson's authorized biography of Apple's co-founder. The book goes on sale Monday, less than three weeks after Jobs' long battle with pancreatic cancer culminated in his Oct. 5 death. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma) Caption People walk past a screen showing the cover of the book "Steve Jobs," by Walter Isaacson at a book shop in Hong Kong Monday, Oct. 24, 2011. The depths of Jobs' antipathy toward Google leaps out of Walter Isaacson's authorized biography of Apple's co-founder. The book goes on sale Monday, less than three weeks after Jobs' long battle with pancreatic cancer culminated in his Oct. 5 death. (AP Photo/Vincent Yu)