The Styrian author presents her work, which tells the life story of Pepi Heußerer, who was born in the interwar period as the unmarried child of a farm labourer and a farmhand and yet managed to master his life.
As a ‘Staudenwaugerl’, he was one of the many children who were given away, swapped, sold or simply given away because there was not enough to eat at home or for similar reasons. Born in 1928, Pepi also experienced the hard farm work before mechanisation, the sociability in the countryside, for example at ‘Woazschälen’ or name day celebrations.
Faith still played a major role back then and hierarchies were strictly regulated. The village schools were teeming with children. The Second World War with its atrocities, especially in the border region of south-west Styria, obviously instilled less fear in the young Pepi than his foster father. But Pepi persevered. He worked as a farm labourer, miner, fish cutter, tavern boy, fur cleaner and much more.
He finally found happiness in Cäcilia.
Date and time
Event location
Lannach - Bibliothek Lannach