Aldiss's father ran a department store that his grandfather had established, and the family lived above it. At the age of 6, Brian was sent to board at West Buckland School in Devon, which he attended until his late teens. In 1943, he joined the Royal Signals regiment, and saw action in Burma; his Army experience inspired the Horatio Stubbs second and third books. He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1990. On 1 July 2008 he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Liverpool in recognition of his contribution to literature.