Miklós Miskolczi

Miklós Miskolczi was born on 2 July 1938 in Szabadka, the town now known as Subotica in Serbia. According to Blikk, his childhood and family roots were closely bound up with the Bácska region and with Kelebia, the village on the Hungarian side of the border, which he later wrote about in his local history Trianon gyermeke, Kelebia.

At the age of sixteen he moved to Sztálinváros, the new socialist industrial town being built around the Danube Ironworks, which was renamed Dunaújváros in 1961. The municipality later said that the town became not only his home but one of the most important subjects of his work and a defining part of his whole life. In 1975 he graduated from the political college of the ruling Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party.

Miskolczi began writing for Üst, the newspaper of the Danube Ironworks, and in 1961 joined the Dunaújvárosi Hírlap, the town's daily paper. He was a member of the Hungarian Journalists' Association (MÚOSZ) from 1961 until his death. From 1975 to 1977 he worked at the Fejér Megyei Hírlap in Székesfehérvár, first as a staff writer and then as a senior writer, and from 1977 to 1981 he edited the journal Propagandista.

He returned to Dunaújváros in 1981 as editor in chief of the Dunaújvárosi Hírlap, a post he held until 1985. Colleagues regarded this as one of the outstanding periods of the town's press, and on his initiative the paper launched a bicycle tour that became one of Dunaújváros's most popular community events and is still held. He was then deputy editor in chief of Vasárnapi Hírek from 1985 to 1986 and a senior writer at the weekly Képes 7 from 1986 to 1990.

In 1987 he was one of the screenwriters of Szomszédok, the Hungarian television serial that ran for many years, and with György Szabó he wrote Nyolc évszak, published as a film novel the same year. In 1990 he stood as an independent candidate in the first free parliamentary elections, an experience he described with satire in Ne válasszon engem! He also appeared as an actor in the series Angyali történetek in 2000.

In the autumn of 1991 he submitted the concept and the name for a new women's weekly to József Bayer, chief executive of Axel Springer in Hungary. He wanted a name with a direct, old-fashioned but friendly tone that people would remember. Kiskegyed launched in 1992 with a first print run of 30,000 copies, which rose week by week. Miskolczi was its editor in chief from the first issue until 2002. Blikk reported that the magazine, which covered relationships, sex, lifestyle and celebrity, became one of the most popular women's magazines of 1990s Hungary, selling about half a million copies a week at its peak, and that it was the first to write openly about subjects previously considered taboo. After 2002 he was creative director at Axel Springer, and in 2012 he compiled a history of the magazine's great years.

As an author he published more than twenty books. His sociographies Színlelni boldog szeretőt (1981) and Hazudni boldog hitvest (1985) examined marriage, infidelity and the workings of relationships, drawing on readers' letters and confessions, and were widely read by both men and women. He also wrote reportage, satirical novels such as Elvtársaim ingben, glóriában (1990), a pamphlet on old age, and many works of local history about Dunaújváros, Kelebia and Tompa. In his later years he collected Dunaújváros residents' memories in Mi, dunaújvárosiak, a series of portraits first written on Facebook.

According to Blikk, Miskolczi deliberately kept his private and family life out of the public eye and away from the gossip press, although he said that some of the material for his books came from observing his own life. He had a son, who announced his death. He lived for most of his life in and around Dunaújváros, the town whose people and history he spent decades recording.

Miklós Miskolczi died on 12 October 2026, in the 89th year of his life, according to the death notice published by the municipality of Dunaújváros. He was 88. His son informed the newspaper Blikk, which reported the death on 16 October, and the news was carried the same day by 24.hu and the Dunaújváros news site Duol. The place and cause of death were not made public.

The municipality of Dunaújváros described him as the chronicler of the town who had spent decades writing, researching and preserving its history, and said that his work and memory would live on in the books, stories and community traditions he left behind. The town declared him one of its own honoured dead and said that the date of his funeral would be announced later.

Miskolczi is remembered nationally as the founder of Kiskegyed, which remains a leading Hungarian women's magazine, and as an author who wrote frankly and readably about love, marriage and fidelity. Blikk described his editorial style as direct, sensitive to the psychology of everyday life and at home with popular culture, and said that he respected women and addressed them as partners.

In Dunaújváros he is remembered as the town's chronicler. The municipality said that his sociography Város lesz, csakazértis remains an important document of the town's history, and that he helped ensure that its story would be told not only through official dates and events but through the memories and lives of the people who lived there. His honours included the literary prize of the publisher Szépirodalmi Könyvkiadó in 1981, honorary citizenship of Dunaújváros in 2006 and the Aranytoll award of the Hungarian Journalists' Association in 2022.