He was born in Budapest into a Jewish family,[1][2][3] the son of László Nádas (originally Nussbaum) and Klára Tauber.

After the takeover of the Hungarian Nazis, the Arrow Cross Party on 15 October 1944, Klára Tauber escaped with her son to Bačka and Novi Sad, but returned to the capital directly before the Siege of Budapest.

In 1958, his father—head of department in one of the ministries, slandered with accusations of embezzlement, then exonerated by the court of all charges—committed suicide; Péter Nádas became an orphan at 16.

Since the early 1970s, he has frequently spent time in Berlin, Germany, attending lectures at Humboldt University or reading in the Staatsbibliothek.

He published his latest novel, the three-volume Parallel Stories (I: The Mute Realm, II: In the Very Depth of the Night, III: The Breath of Freedom) in 2005.

The novel has been described as "a virtuoso combination of nineteenth-century high realism with the experimentalism of the nouveau roman", while "the real narrative is that of bodies' actions on one another, their attraction and desires, their mutual memories" (Gábor Csordás).

Works translated into English: He has received numerous awards, including He has also been nominated for the Nobel Prize.