Evelyn Waugh was born on October 28, 1903, in Hampstead, London, England, the son of Arthur (an editor and publisher) and Catherine Charlotte (Raban) Waugh. He was enrolled at Lancing, a preparatory school, in 1917, where he wrote poetry, edited the school magazine, and was president of the debating society.

Waugh won a scholarship to Hertford College, Oxford, in 1922. At Oxford, he wrote poetry and stories for undergraduate magazines but, because of financial difficulties, he left the university in 1924 without graduating. He enrolled at Heatherley's Art School, and in 1925 he became a secondary school teacher in Wales and then in Buckinghamshire, England.

In 1927, Waugh married Evelyn Gardner. In 1928, his first novel, Decline and Fall, appeared. This was a satire on the English upper classes and the English educational system. While Waugh was writing his second novel, Vile Bodies (1930), he discovered that his wife was having an affair, so he...