Beatles magazine from 1963 returns

2014 Collector’s Edition of the “Meet The Beatles” magazine.

Souvenir Press Ltd, the company who released the magazine “Meet The Beatles” in 1963 has announced that the company will reissue the magazine on 3 November 2014. Some report that the new edition has already hit the news stands in the U.K.

The company says that this will be a hardback collector’s edition for a new generation of Beatles fans. Originally priced at 2 shillings and sixpence, the new edition will be priced £10 in the U.K., and $12,05 in U.S.A.

The original had a soft cover.

This is a faithful reissue of the original 38 page publication. And it is very much an introduction to the band, featuring a photographic day in the life as well as rarely seen images taken of their first London appearance and a performance on the TV programme Thank Your Lucky Stars.

The introduction to the book comes from Tony Barrow, the man who coined the phrase “the Fab Four”. Most of the photos were taken by Dezo Hoffmann, the rest were from Peter Kaye, Graham Spencer, Stan McLeod, Cyrus Andrews and ABC Television.

The original edition was the first official book the band released, after Ernest Hecht, founder and publisher at Souvenir, saw them play live in Finsbury Park, London, and bought the rights from the band’s manager Brian Epstein.

The idea to reissue the title came from watching the 50th anniversary media reports about the band, as well as the publicity Mark Lewisohn’s biography of the band has been getting.

The original edition is Souvenir’s biggest selling title of all time, selling more than one million copies. The rights were also licensed to publishing houses in other countries, who offered translated versions of the book to their customers.

Danish edition

Hecht says: “We want to make sure every Beatles fanatic we know of knows that this book is coming out.”

Hecht wanted to keep the book exactly the same as it was, in order for it to act as a piece of memorabilia, and declined Tony Barrow’s offer to write an updated introduction. To us, it’s amazing that these people are still with us.

Chapters:

• Personal Portraits
• Beatle Background
• Beatling Beside The Seaside
• Back Home With The Beatles
• Chart-toppers At Their Moment Of Truth
• Stars Of Stage, Home-Screen & Radio
• A London Day In The Life Of The Beatles
• From Us To You – A Personal Introduction To “Meet The Beatles” By George, John, Paul And Ringo.

The Scandinavian editions of the magazine had a follow up, Meet The Beatles number two, I don’t know if this was the case elsewhere as well?

“Meet The Beatles no. 2”  from Norway.