Aranka Siegal: key obituary facts
Is Aranka Siegal dead? Yes. Aranka Siegal died on November 2, 2026, at age 96.
Cause of death: Aranka Siegal's cause of death has not been publicly confirmed.
What was Aranka Siegal known for?
She was a Hungarian born American writer.
More about Aranka Siegal
Born: 10 June 1930.
Place of birth: Berehove.
Gender: female.
Occupation: memoirist, writer.
Nationality: United States, Czechoslovakia.
Education: Florida International University.
Also known as: Aranka Meizlik.
Aranka Siegal, a novelist and Holocaust survivor, died November 2, 2026, aged 96.
Born Aranka Meizlik in Berehovo, now in Ukraine, she became an American writer whose books drew on her childhood in Hungary and experience of Nazi persecution. Her best-known work, “Upon the Head of the Goat: A Childhood in Hungary, 1930-1944,” recounts her early life before her 12-month imprisonment in Auschwitz-Birkenau and Bergen-Belsen.
The memoir brought Siegal wide recognition: in 1982, it received both a Newbery Honor and the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award. She also wrote “Grace in the Wilderness: After the Liberation, 1945-1948” and “Memories of Babi,” completing a body of three books. Her work was translated into several languages, including French, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Dutch and German. Siegal studied at Florida International University and was also known as Aranka Meizlik. Her writing traced experiences of childhood, imprisonment and life after liberation, bringing her personal history to readers through memoir and fiction.