Petru Popescu

Petru Popescu (born. February 1, 1944 in Bucharest, Romania) is a Romanian writer, director and movie producer, author of best-selling novels "Almost Adam" and "Amazon Beaming".


Born in family of intellectuals, he was traumatized by premature death of his twin brother and the divorce of his parents. He studied Germanic languages at Bucharest University, graduating in 1967. His made his debut with a poetry book, "Zeu printre blocuri" (A God Between Apartment Buildings), then wrote in 1969 "Prins" (Caught), a novel of grand success, which launched him as a reference writer in Romanian literature. He is known for his romance with Zoe Ceauşescu, daughter of Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceauşescu, but claims are said to be exaggerated by media and Securitate (the Secret Police).

Petru Popescu obtained a scholarship in Vienna (1971-1972), and in 1974 accepted an invitation from the University of Iowa to participate at International Writing Program seminary. At that point, he decided to leave Romania and establish residence in the United States. From then on, he steadily followed a successful path as a novelist and author of several Hollywood movie scripts. After the fall of the Iron Curtain, he returned often to Romania as of 1992, where most of his works have been translated from English and published.