StudienVerlag - Oapen

Von Katherine Webb (Hutchinson & Co.)
London, 20.10.1944
Ms. m. Kopf m. U. (Kopie), DÖW 11548/8
Personal.
Dear Robert Neumann,
I have now had an opportunity of discussing your personal arrangement with Mr.
Hutchinson and although he agrees to make the arrangement 15% of the profits
of H.I.A.L. or £ 500 – I should say a minimum of £ 500 per annum – he is not in
agreement to make the arrangement for as long as your contract lasts and suggests
it should be from year to year.
Furthermore, we did not discuss when the arrangement should commence but I
presume you wanted the first year to be this year – 1944. However, Mr. Hutchinson
suggests we make it for one year commencing June, 1944 to June, 1945 and for that
twelve months we pay you 15% of the profits or £ 500 minimum. You see if we took
it for the whole of 1944 the profits would not be very considerable as we shall only
be publishing about four books as far as I can see.
After June, 1945 we shall all see how H.I.A.L. is progressing and we then reconsider
the matter.
I hope the above will meet with your approval. It is the best I could do.
Yours sincerely,
HUTCHINSON & CO (Publishers) Ltd.
K. H. Webb
Die Entscheidungen im Verlag „H.I.A.L“ (Hutchinson International Authors Limited)
traf die literarisch wenig versierte Direktorin Webb; die faktische Rolle von RN ist die
eines literarischen Konsulenten und freien Lektoratsmitarbeiters (bei Übersetzungen
deutschsprachiger Autoren). – In den Jahren bis zur Auflösung des Vertrags von RN
(1949) sind bei HIAL Werke von RN selbst, ferner von Arnold Zweig, Heinrich Mann,
Alfred Neumann, Lion Feuchtwanger, F. C. Weiskopf, Franz Werfel, Emil Ludwig und
Ferencz Körmendi erschienen. Gescheitert ist RN u. a. mit der Bemühung, Hermann
Brochs „Schlafwandler“ durchzusetzen.
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