Tobias Wolff was born in 1945 in Alabama. His parents divorced when he was a boy. Wolff's mother retained custody of him, while his brother Geoffrey— who also became a writer—lived with their father. As a child, Wolff traveled with his mother, Rosemary, to the Pacific Northwest, where she remarried. This period of Wolff's life is recounted in This Boy's Life: A Memoir, which was later made into a film.

Wolff briefly attended preparatory school on the East Coast, but he was expelled. From 1964 through 1968, Wolff served as a lieutenant with the U.S. Army Special Forces (Green Berets) in Vietnam. He later recounted his wartime experiences in the memoir In the Pharaoh's Army: Memoirs of the Lost War.

Wolff earned his B.A. in 1972 and then his M.A. from Oxford University three years later. That year, his first book, Ugly Rumours, was...