Ede Szigligeti

Who was Ede Szigligeti?

Ede Szigligeti was a Hungarian dramatist.

He was born József Szathmáry, at Nagyvárad-Olaszi. His parents would have made him a priest; he wanted to be a great doctor; finally he entered the office of an engineer. But his heart was already devoted to the drama and, on 15 August 1834, despite the prohibition of his tyrannical father, he actually appeared upon the stage at Budapest. His father thereupon forbade lim to bear his name in future, and the younger Szathmary henceforth adopted instead the name of Ede Szigligeti, the hero of one of Sandor Kisfaludy's romances.

He supported himself for the next few years precariously enough, earning as le did little more than twelve florins a month, but at the same time he sedulously devoted himself to the theatre and sketched several plays, which differed so completely from the "original" plays then in vogue that they attracted the attention of such connoisseurs as Vorosmarty and Bajza who warmly encouraged the young writer. In 1840 the newly founded Hungarian Academy crowned his five-act drama Rosa, the title-role of which was brilliantly acted by Rosa Laborfalvy, the great actress, who subsequently married Maurus Jokai.