One of the most prominent contemporary authors in Hungarian literature, Péter Esterházy is acknowledged as the leader of the so-called middle generation of writers-those born in the decade between World War II and the October 1956 revolution-and is considered by many to be the finest living Hungarian prose writer. Throughout his career Esterházy has generated controversy concerning the quality and interpretation of his work, but there is no doubt of his role in almost single-handedly changing mainstream Hungarian fiction by rejecting the traditional conventions of narrative prose in favor of the linguistic and stylistic techniques of literary postmodernism.

The Esterházy name has been among the most prominent in Hungary since the early seventeenth century, when the family became one of the leading clans of the aristocracy in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Since then the Esterházys have played a significant though...