Serge Lecomte was born in Belgium in 1946. He came to the United States where he spent his teens in South Philadelphia and later Brooklyn. After graduating from Tilden H. S., he joined the Medical Corps in the Air Force. He earned an M.A. and Ph.D. from Vanderbilt University in Russian Literature with a minor in French Literature. He worked as a Green Beret language instructor at Fort Bragg, NC from 1975-78. In 1988 he received a B.A. from the University of Alaska Fairbanks in Spanish Literature. He worked as a language teacher at the University of Alaska from 1978 to 1997.