Margaret Eleanor Atwood is born in Ottawa, Ontario, to Carl Edmund Atwood, an entomologist, and Margaret Dorothy Killam Atwood, a nutritionist. Her early childhood was spent primarily in the backwoods of northern Quebec, where her father conducted research on forest insects. This formative experience instilled in her a deep connection to nature and a keen awareness of the human impact on the environment, themes that would later permeate her writing.

Atwood's formal education flourished at Victoria College at the University of Toronto, where she studied English, French, and Philosophy. She graduated in 1961 with a Bachelor of Arts degree and later earned a master's degree from Radcliffe College in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This period was crucial in shaping her literary sensibilities and laying the foundation for her future work, exposing her to a wide range of literary traditions and critical perspectives.