Kenneth Grahame was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on March 8, 1859. His mother died in 1864, after which Grahame and his three siblings were raised by their uncle, living first in Berkshire and then Cranbourne, England. Childhood illness left Grahame with respiratory problems that followed him throughout his life. After attending St. Edward’s School in Oxford, Grahame aspired to attend Oxford University, but he was denied funding by his uncle. Instead, he moved to London and began work at the Bank of England.

Grahame quickly advanced at the Bank, while concurrently composing his first work. appeared in the in 1888, and his first book, , was published in 1893. (1895), which met popular and critical success, was a collection of tales of average childhood, and was followed by the similarly-themed (1899).

In July 1899, Grahame married Elspeth Thomson. The following May, they had a son, Alastair Grahame. Born prematurely, Alastair was blind in one eye and had poor vision in the other. In 1908, Grahame resigned from the Bank and moved his family to Mayfield, Cookham Dene, Berkshire, where he began to develop another series of stories written for and possibly contributed to by Alastair. These formed the basis for , published in 1908, which was met with wide success in Great Britain and the United States.

The Grahame family moved to Boham’s, Blewbury, Berkshire, in May 1910. Grahame wrote little else following , but he edited (1916). In the meantime, Alastair struggled in school, and in May 1920 he was killed in a train accident. After the death of their son, Kenneth and Elspeth traveled throughout Italy. Upon their return in 1924 they sold Boham’s and moved to Church Cottage, Pangbourne, Berkshire, where the couple became reclusive. Grahame’s health, poor throughout his life, continued to decline until his death on July 6, 1932. His will established the Kenneth Grahame Fund, to which all of Grahame’s royalties were given; the Fund is the primary purchasing fund for the Bodleian Library at Oxford University.