Stephane Groueff

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Stephane Groueff, a writer, journalist and a political refugee, was born in Sofia, Bulgaria in 1922. He was studying law in the University of Geneva when the communists seized power in his country in 1944. His father was Chief of Cabinet of King Boris III and was executed by the communists in 1945. Groueff lived in exile for 46 years: first in Switzerland and later in France and the USA. He did not return to Bulgaria until 1990 after the collapse of the communist regime. He was a reporter for the "Paris-Match" magazine and after traveling extensively as a foreign correspondent, he became its New York Bureau chief for 20 years until 1978.

He also worked for Radio Free Europe, was a contributor to the Bulgarian Service of BBC and was active in a few emigre organizations and publications in exile.

He was the first Bulgarian to visit Antarctica as a journalist and to have set foot on the South Pole. In 2002 the American University in Bulgaria, of which Stephane Groueff was one of the founding Board members, conferred on him the honorary degree Doctor of Humane Letters, and the President of the Republic of Bulgaria decorated him with the "Madara Horseman" order for "...his outstanding contribution to popularizing the Bulgarian culture the world over and promoting history science in Bulgaria and abroad." As a historian of the construction of the first atomic bomb, he was recently invited as a speaker at the 60th commemoration of the "Manhattan Project" in Washington D.C. and in Oak Ridge.

A naturalized American citizen, he lives presently in Southampton, New York. He is married to an American-born wife and has a son and two grandchildren.

Groueff is the author of eight non-fiction books in French and English, three of which, "Manhattan Project," "Crown of Thorns," and "My Odyssey" were translated in Bulgarian. His latest autobiographical work, "My Odyssey," was published in 2002 in Bulgarian and in 2003 in English. "My Odyssey" is dedicated to his late brother Simeon, who "chose the harder road and lived in Bulgaria until his last breath." The author adds: "My destiny was to have an unusually diverse and colorful life, with many rewards, professional and personal. My odyssey has also its sad stages, but as a whole it is a lucky and happy one."