[Proverbs 3-5]

Some argue for circumstance, positing that if Julius Caesar had been born illiterate in 640 A.D., no one alive today would even know his name. Others would counter that if Thomas Edison had been born illiterate in 640 A.D., the printing press would have been invented nine centuries or so earlier.

I was born illiterate!

[.cnI redruM]

Point taken. "Had grown up illiterate" would correct that malapropism.