The family has produced governors, ministers, and prime ministers, as well as rebel leaders and warlords. Esterházy's grandfather, Count Móric Esterházy, was a prime minister for a brief period in 1917 and a member of parliament several times. In 1944 he took part in Governor Miklós Horthy de Nagybánya's unsuccessful attempt to negotiate a peace treaty before the German invasion.
The writer's father, Mátyás Esterházy, was also a count; thus, although he was highly educated and spoke several languages, he was treated by the Communists as a dangerous "déclassé element." He married Lili Mányoky in 1948; soon after the birth of their first son, Péter, on 14 April 1950, the family was relocated to a rural village, where Mátyás and Lili Esterházy were forced to work in the fields. Seeing his parents uphold their aristocratic values amid these ordeals played a significant role in the development of Péter Esterházy's personality and worldview.
After the unsuccessful 1956 revolution the family was allowed to return to Budapest. Esterházy completed elementary school in 1964 and went on to the Piarista Gymnasium, which was among the few remaining secondary schools run by religious orders. The school had remained free of Communist influence and was (and still is) one of the best educational institutions in the country.
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