Throughout his teenage years, apart from reading, Esterhazy's main pastime was playing soccer. Even as a wellknown writer he continued to play regularly at a local club, and the nuances of the game have an important role in his early writings. (One of his three younger brothers, Marton Esterhazy, became a highly successful professional soccer player.)
In 1969 Esterhazy entered the Faculty of Mathematics of Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest; one of his idols, Geza Ottlik, author of the novel Iskola a hataron (1959; translated as School at the Frontier, 1966), was also a mathematician. After graduating in 1974, Esterhazy was employed as a consultant in systematization in the Ministry of Metallurgy and Machine Industry. The job offered him subject matter for some of his later works. He quit in 1978; since then he has been a freelance writer.
Esterhazy married Gitta Reen in 1973. They have two daughters and two sons: Dora, born in 1975; Marcell, born in 1977; Zsofi, born in 1982; and Miklos, born in 1987. Although his literary interests are many and varied, Esterhazy's family gives him his most important themes and is his main source of inspiration.
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