After World War I , Lengyel went to the United States for a longer stay and published his experiences in 1922 in a book '' Amerikai napló '' ( '' American Journal '' ) . In the 1920s , he was active in the film industry . For some time , he was story editor at May-Film in Berlin . In 1929/30 , he was co-director of a Budapest theatre . In 1931 , he was sent by the Hungarian newspaper '' Pesti Napló '' ( '' Pest Journal '' ) to London as its reporter . The story of his Utopian novel '' A boldog város '' ( '' The Happy City '' ) came out in 1931 ; it was set in an American city that lay in the depths of a chasm created by the great Californian earthquake
Californian earthquake
1906 San Francisco earthquake
Melchior Lengyel