It's time to say "good-bye", queen of daytime television Oprah Winfrey said on Saturday as she announced to take her iconic 25-year-old talk show 'The Oprah Winfrey Show' off the air in September 2011.
"I love this show. This show has been my life. And I love it enough to know when it is time to say good-bye," said Winfrey, holding back tears.
"Twenty-five years feels right in my bones and it feels right in my spirit. It is the perfect number, the exact right time," Winfrey said at the end of her hour-long show broadcast live from the city.
Speculation has been rife that she is bringing the curtains down on 'The Oprah Winfrey Show' because she is preparing to launch her cable network - OWN -The Oprah Winfrey Network in association with Discovery Communications.
However, Winfrey sought to put to rest the conjecture saying, "Over the next couple of days, you may hear a lot of speculation in the press about why I am making this decision now...and that will mostly be conjecture.
"After much prayer and months of careful thought, I have decided that next season, Season 25, will be the last season of The Oprah Winfrey Show," the television Mogul said.
The show, first aired 24 years ago on September 8, 1986 from this city, has been telecast in 145 countries across the world besides being one of the TV industry's biggest money-spinners and the top-rated US daytime talk show for close to two decades.
Winfrey, 55, has been a regular on lists of the world's most powerful and influential people, with the latest being Forbes ranking her at number 45 in its list of the 'World's Most Influential People'.
"These years with you, our viewers, have enriched my life beyond all measure. And you have graciously invited me into your living rooms, into your kitchens and into your lives. And for some of you longtime Oprah viewers, you have literally grown up with me..we've grown together," Winfrey said.
Promising her viewers that the final lap of her journey as a talk show host would be a memorable one, Winfrey said that in the next few months, she and her team would brainstorm "new ways that we can entertain you and inform you and uplift you when we return here in January.
"In Season 25, we are going to knock your socks off," she said.
"So, the countdown to the end of The Oprah Winfrey Show starts now and until that day in 2011 when it ends, I intend to soak up every meaningful, joy-filled moment with you," Winfrey said.
Over the years, Winfrey has built an empire of about $ 2.5 billion as she touched the lives of millions of viewers across the world through her shows on women empowerment, education, health and lifestyle. PTI
