Michael Zifcak was born in Dobsina, Czechoslovakia and migrated to Australia in 1950. He joined the Collins Book Depot in Melbourne in 1951. He became a chairman of Collins Booksellers and of its subsidiary, Hill of Content Publishing Co, of which he was also the publishing director. Zifcak retired from bookselling in 2001. His autobiography My Life in Print (2006) records his experiences as a refugee in Europe and his life in the Melbourne book trade.
Zifcak established the National Book Council in 1973 and was its first chairman. He was awarded an OBE in 1981, and in 1992 was the first winner of the Lloyd O'Neil Award for services to the Australian book industry.
