The Story Starts with a Book
Like many great films throughout history, The Graduate is based on a novel. The original story was a novella, published in 1963 and written by American novelist Charles Richard Webb. Born in San Francisco and raised in Pasadena, Webb attended local schools growing up.
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He then headed across the country to pursue his college education at Williams College in Massachusetts. Webb wrote The Graduate not long after his graduation, taking inspiration from his own life while writing it. It was his first novel and would go on to become his most famous work as well.