He authored a number of books, articles and essays in the areas of cultural history, literary theory, musicology, art history, and German studies.
After finishing elementary school in his home town he went on to attend gymnasiums in Virovitica and Osijek.
He then enrolled at the University of Zagreb Faculty of Philosophy and earned a double major degree in Yugoslav and German studies.
He earned a doctorate in 1959 and later spent almost 30 years as a tenured university professor teaching German literature at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences in Zagreb, from 1971 until his retirement in 1999.
Žmegač was a full member of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts (HAZU) and member of the Saxonian Academy of Sciences and Academia Europaea.