Name Lars Gyllenhaal Role Author | Education University of Savoy | |
 | ||
Books Swedes at War: Willing Warriors of a Neutral Nation, 1914¿1945 | ||
Lars Herman Folke Gyllenhaal (born 9 July 1968) is a Swedish author. He writes about military history and in particular, about Swedish involvement in wars of the 20th century. In 2011, Gyllenhaal was awarded "Citizen of the Year" of Piteå for his contribution to military history.
Contents
Personal biography
Gyllenhaal is the only child of former press counsellor to the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs and member of the Gyllenhaal family of Swedish nobility, Herman Gyllenhaal and nurse Monica Gyllenhaal, née Wennerholm. Gyllenhaal married Ann-Sofie Gyllenhaal, née Svensson. They have one son and one daughter. The family live in Piteå in North Sweden.
Education and career
Gyllenhaal studied French at the University of Savoy in France, and Russian at a language institute in Moscow, USSR.
His writing career began as a freelance journalist. From 1992 to 1994 he was employed by local government authorities in the Russian county of Murmansk on the Kola Peninsula.
In 1994, Gyllenhaal returned to Sweden to join Centek, an industry and management development foundation, as a project manager. Six years later, Gyllenhaal left Centek to devote his time to his work on military history and the history of the Barents Region.
Gyllenhaal has provided research for several World War II documentary films such as "Krieg in der Arktis" (War in the Arctic) by Jens Becker and Ralf Daubitz and the prize-winning "Blood Road" and "Under a Rusty Star", both by Gunilla Bresky.
In 2005, Gyllenhaal's book, Swedes at War 1914-1945 (co-written with Lennart Westberg) was nominated for "Swedish History Book of the Year". Since 2005, Gyllenhaal has been an elected member of the Swedish Military History Commission and has been engaged in the development of the Swedish Defense Museum in Boden.