Hans Heyck

Happiness in Bavaria Hans Heyck

HAPPINESS IN BAVARIA is an edited, shortened translation of Hans Heyck's Pegasus im Paradies (Pegasus in Paradise, 1952), the largely autobiographical story of an aspiring German writer, Jan, and his wife Maiken, who after World War One decided that the best place to survive the economic uncertainties of the times was a small piece of land which would provide for the necessi-ties of life. Still childless after seven years of mar-riage, they also hoped that a healthy country en-vironment would increase their chances for having children. In 1922 the couple bought a small piece of land near Lake Ammersee, between Munich and the Alps, and had a small house and barn built on it. They intended to raise sheep and German shep-herd dogs for sale, as well as chickens and pigs for food. Soon after moving to the little farm, Maiken became pregnant for the first time. Hans Heyck writes, often with humor, about the challenges of country life, including raising a variety of animals, floods and storms, the regula-tion of the nearby river, the horrors of inflation and Jan's job as a storehouse keeper, as well as his struggles with writing a novel. He describes the joys and demands of raising a young family, and records the many cute and sometimes not so cute sayings by the children. He mentions the various visitors to the farm, including the princess-midwife who assisted Maiken with the birth of three of the four children. Heyck also has an eye for the natural beauty of Upper Bavaria and describes the satisfaction of living off the land. Gradually, literary success came for Jan; it finally persuaded the settler family to abandon its "paradise" for a more conventional life.