Tina Brown

Tina Brown
source
Name	Tina Brown
Caption	Brown in 2012
Birth name	Christina Hambley Brown
Birth date	21 November 1953
Birth place	Maidenhead, Berkshire, England
Education	St Anne's College, Oxford (BA)
Occupation	Journalist, editor, author
Spouse	Harold Evans, 1981

Tina Brown. Christina Hambley Brown is a British-American journalist, editor, and author renowned for her transformative leadership of major magazines. She revitalized Vanity Fair and The New Yorker in the late 20th century, defining the era's celebrity and literary culture. Her later ventures include founding Talk magazine and leading The Daily Beast, cementing her status as a formidable and controversial media figure.

Early life and education

Born in Maidenhead, she is the daughter of film producer George Hambley Brown and former actress Bettina Brown. She was educated at the Convent of the Sacred Heart before winning a scholarship to the co-educational St Anne's College, Oxford. At Oxford, she became the first female editor of the university's prestigious humor magazine, Isis, and was president of the Oxford University Dramatic Society. Her early journalistic work included contributions to the New Statesman and the Sunday Times, where she began a lifelong professional and personal partnership with editor Harold Evans.

Journalism career

Her early career was marked by sharp, society-focused writing for British publications. She authored a column for the Tatler and published a satirical book, *Loose Talk*, chronicling the social scene. In 1979, she was appointed editor of the Tatler, then a fading society journal, which she dramatically revitalized with a mix of wit, gossip, and high-society coverage, attracting attention from media moguls like S. I. Newhouse. Her success there led to her recruitment by Condé Nast to helm the American revival of Vanity Fair in 1984, marking her ambitious entry into the heart of New York City media.

The New Yorker and Vanity Fair

As editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair from 1984 to 1992, she transformed the publication into a cultural powerhouse, blending high-profile celebrity covers with serious investigative journalism. She commissioned iconic portraits by photographers like Annie Leibovitz and published groundbreaking work by writers such as Dominick Dunne and Marie Brenner. In 1992, she succeeded Robert Gottlieb as editor of The New Yorker, a move that shocked the literary world. There, she introduced photography, more topical reporting, and new sections, significantly boosting newsstand sales but drawing criticism for altering the magazine's revered tradition. She left in 1998 after being passed over for the publisher role.

Talk magazine and The Daily Beast

In 1999, she launched the glossy Talk magazine, a joint venture with Miramax and Hearst Corporation, aiming to blend Hollywood glamour with political discourse. Despite a high-profile launch party on Liberty Island and notable contributors, the magazine folded in 2002 following the September 11 attacks and advertising downturns. In 2008, she returned to media leadership as founder and editor-in-chief of The Daily Beast, a pioneering digital news outlet created in partnership with Barry Diller's IAC. She later engineered its short-lived merger with Newsweek in 2010, serving as editor of the combined entity until 2013.

Books and other projects

She is the author of several bestselling books, including *The Diana Chronicles*, a definitive biography of Diana, Princess of Wales, and *The Vanity Fair Diaries*, a memoir of her years at the magazine drawn from her personal journals. She has also written a biography of the Clinton advisor Vernon Jordan. She founded the live journalism platform Women in the World, hosting annual summits in New York City featuring global female leaders. Her other ventures include hosting the podcast *TBD with Tina Brown* and serving on the board of the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Personal life

She married renowned editor Harold Evans in 1981, a union that became one of the most powerful partnerships in media. They have two children, a son and a daughter. The family divides their time between Manhattan and Sagaponack in the Hamptons. She became a naturalized citizen of the United States in 2005. A prominent figure in social and literary circles, she has been awarded numerous honors including Commander of the Order of the British Empire and has served on the boards of the New York Public Library and the Smithsonian Institution.

Category:British journalists Category:British magazine editors Category:1953 births Category:Living people