Cotta's audio stage
Cotta's Hörbühne or Cottas Hörspielbühne was a sound carrier series from the Klett-Cotta publishing house , within which radio play productions and later other literary programs of the public broadcasters were published.
The radio play stage at the end of the 1950s
In 1959 Cotta'sche Verlagbuchhandlung in Stuttgart published Max Ophül's adaptation and staging of Goethe's novella under the name Cottas Hörspielbühne . It was an "original co-production by Südwestfunk and Bayerischer Rundfunk , which was broadcast for the first time in April 1954". Oskar Werner acted as the reader . Other contributors included a. Otto Collin , Käthe Gold , Erik Schumann , Willy Birgel or Therese Giehse . With Wolfgang Borchert's Draußen vor der Tür , another edition of the radio play stage appeared in 1960, this time on two phonograph records , and Artur Müller was responsible for the publication . These were the original recording of the broadcast of the NWDR Hamburg from 13. February 1947 under the direction of Ludwig Cremer with Hans Quest had dedicated, the Borchert his radio play. After this, no further publications followed in the series.
The audio stage in the 1980s
In 1986, in the “age” of the audio book , which was just beginning , the series reappeared, now as Cotta's audio stage on audio cassettes from the company that has since merged into Klett-Cotta-Verlag. Klett-Cotta was the first audience publisher , who drove a modern audio book series. The initiator and editor of the series was Hermann Naber , head of radio plays at SWF. Again, contrary to the general trend towards unabridged readings, there was an exemplary selection of high-quality radio plays on the program. A preference for classic productions from past decades remained, e.g. B. numerous original radio plays by Dürrenmatt . A close connection to the record series started in 1959 and abruptly discontinued could also be seen in the renewed publication of Goethe's novella and Borchert's Outside Front Door .
Poetry readings
From 1988, under the subtitle Authors read, an edition of mostly historical poetry readings - also from recordings on public broadcasting - joined the radio play program. You can hear z. B. Heinrich Böll , Siegfried Lenz , Christa Wolf , Alfred Andersch , Wolfdietrich Schnurre , Gottfried Benn , Jean Améry and Helmut Heißenbüttel .
fail
Even if, according to the Börsenblatt des Deutschen Buchhandels (1987), the new edition of the Klett-Cotta Hörbühne initiated the "turnaround" in terms of the commercial success of the audio book, the series barely survived half a decade due to its lack of success. From 1990 onwards, only a few publications appeared under the Cotta's Hörbühne label . In 1993 the series was completely discontinued.
In the same year, however, Klett-Cotta was involved in founding the Hörverlag (DHV - Der Hörverlag) and included the titles of its catalog in it.