Reading Kenneth Grahame’s The Wind in the Willows, one of the classics of children's literature, and did a little reading about the author himself.
Grahame wanted to attend Oxford University, but was not allowed to do so by his guardian on grounds of cost. Instead he was sent to work at the Bank of England in 1879. He rose through the ranks until retiring as its Secretary in 1908 due to ill health, which may have been precipitated by a ‘strange, possibly political’ shooting incident at the bank in 1903, where Grahame was shot at three times.
Grahame's Bank career is little-known, but it is very likely that his thirty-year career had some influence on his writing; the influence of colleagues on the famous characters he created and the atmosphere of life at the grand old institution. Many sources say, ‘Grahame's departure from the Bank is quite mysterious.' He was awarded an annual pension of £400 though he was actually due £710; Grahame needn't have worried as The Wind in the Willows was published shortly thereafter.
Grahame wanted to attend Oxford University, but was not allowed to do so by his guardian on grounds of cost. Instead he was sent to work at the Bank of England in 1879. He rose through the ranks until retiring as its Secretary in 1908 due to ill health, which may have been precipitated by a ‘strange, possibly political’ shooting incident at the bank in 1903, where Grahame was shot at three times.
Grahame's Bank career is little-known, but it is very likely that his thirty-year career had some influence on his writing; the influence of colleagues on the famous characters he created and the atmosphere of life at the grand old institution. Many sources say, ‘Grahame's departure from the Bank is quite mysterious.' He was awarded an annual pension of £400 though he was actually due £710; Grahame needn't have worried as The Wind in the Willows was published shortly thereafter.
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