1809 (6 August) Born at Somersby, Lincolnshire, fourth son of Rev. George Clayton Tennyson the younger, Rector of Somersby, and of Elizabeth Tennyson (née Fytche). T.’s father had been virtually dis-inherited by T.’s grandfather in favour of a younger brother, and T.’s youth was overshadowed by this family feud between the Tennysons of Somersby and the grandparents with their favoured son (later Charles Tennyson d’Eyncourt) of Bayons Manor.
1816 Pupil at Louth Grammar School, where his elder brothers Frederick (b. 1807) and Charles (b. 1808) had started in 1814 and 1815.
1820 Leaves Louth, to be privately educated at home by his father.
1823–4 Writes The Devil and the Lady, in imitation of Elizabethan drama.
1824 Serious breakdown in the health, physical and mental, of his father.
1827 (April) Publishes Poems by Two Brothers, by T. and his brother Charles, with a few poems by Frederick. T.’s contributions were written ‘between 15 and 17’.
(November) Enters Trinity College, Cambridge, together with Charles (October), joining Frederick (1826) there.
1828 (October) Arthur Henry Hallam (b. 1811) enters Trinity, meeting T. probably in April 1829.
1829 Friendship with Hallam.
(June) Wins the Chancellor’s Gold Medal with his prize poem, Timbuctoo.
(October) Elected a member of the ‘Apostles’, an undergraduate debating society to which most of his Cambridge friends belonged.
(December) Hallam may first meet T.’s sister Emily (b. 1811), with whom he was to fall in love. (This traditional dating given by H. T. was vigorously contested by J. Kolb, RES n.s. xxviii (1977) 32–48, arguing for April 1830; it was re-affirmed by R. B. Martin.)
1830 (June) Publishes Poems, Chiefly Lyrical.
(July–September) Visits the Pyrenees with Hallam.
1831 (March) Death of his father.
Leaves Cambridge without taking a degree.
(August) Hallam’s essay ‘On Some of the Characteristics of Modern Poetry and on the Lyrical Poems of Alfred Tennyson’ in Englishman’s Magazine.
1832 (May) Severe, though not indiscriminate, review of 1830 by ‘Christopher North’ (John Wilson) in Blackwood’s Magazine.
(July) Visits the Rhine country with Hallam.
(Autumn) Hallam’s engagement to Emily grudgingly recognized by the Hallams.
(October) Insanity, eventually incurable, of his brother Edward (b. 1813).
(December) Publishes Poems (title-page dated 1833).
1833 Begins revising many poems of 1830 and 1832.
(April) Venomous review of 1832 by J. W. Croker in Quarterly Review.
(September) Death of Hallam from a haemorrhage, while visiting Vienna.
1834 Falls in love with Rosa Baring, with whom he seems to have become disillusioned by 1835–6. (She married Robert Shafto in 1838.)
1835 (March) His brother Charles inherits an estate and changes his name to Turner.
1836 (May) Marriage of Charles to Louisa Sellwood, and the beginning of T.’s love for her sister Emily Sellwood, whom T. had met in 1830.
1837 (May) The Tennysons move from Somersby to High Beech, Epping.
(September) Persuaded by Richard Monckton Milnes to contribute to The Tribute, in which he publishes Oh! that ‘twere possible. Engagement to Emily Sellwood recognized by her family and his.
1840 Engagement broken off, partly or ostensibly because of T.’s financial insecurity. The Tennysons move to Tunbridge Wells (and in 1841 to Boxley).
(February) Edward FitzGerald reports that T. is ‘really ill, in a nervous way’, a condition which persists into the late 1840s.
1840–41 Invests his fortune (about £3,000) in a wood-carving scheme, which has collapsed by 1843.
1842 (May) Publishes Poems. The first volume selects poems from 1830 and 1832 together with a few written c. 1833; the second volume consists of new poems.
1843–4 Receives treatment in a hydropathic hospital near Cheltenham.
1845 (September) Is granted a Civil List pension of £200 p.a.
1846 (August) Visits Switzerland with his publisher Edward Moxon.
1847 (December) Publishes The Princess.
1848 Visits Ireland and Cornwall, taking up again a projected Arthurian enterprise.
1849 Renews correspondence with Emily Sellwood.
1850 (May) Publishes In Memoriam anonymously in the last week of May (the first commercial announcement, 1 June).
(June) Marries Emily.
(November) Appointed Poet Laureate, Wordsworth having died in April.
1851 (April) A still-born baby boy.
(July) Visits Italy with Emily, returning in October.
1852 (August) Birth of his son Hallam Tennyson.
(November) Publishes Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington.
1853 (November) Moves to Farringford, Isle of Wight, which he buys in 1856.
1854 (March) Birth of his son Lionel.
1855 (June) Hon. D.C.L. at Oxford.
(July) Publishes Maud, and Other Poems.
1859 (July) Publishes Idylls of the King, namely Enid, Vivien, Elaine and Guinevere.
(August) Visits Portugal with F. T. Palgrave.
1860 Assists Palgrave in selecting poems for The Golden Treasury.
1861 (June) Visits the Pyrenees with his family.
1862 (January) Writes Dedication for a new edition of the Idylls of the King, in memory of Albert, Prince Consort (d. December 1861).
(April) First audience with Queen Victoria, at Osborne, Isle of Wight.
1864 (April) Visit by Garibaldi to Farringford.
(August) Publishes Enoch Arden [etc.].
1865 (January) Publishes A Selection from the Works of Alfred Tennyson.
Refuses offer of a baronetcy.
(February) Death of his mother.
1868 (April) Foundation stone laid of his second home, Aldworth, at Blackdown, Haslemere.
1869 (April) Attends the meeting to organize a ‘Metaphysical Society’, which he joins and which flourishes until 1879.
(December) Publishes The Holy Grail and Other Poems (title-page dated 1870).
1870 (December) Reluctantly publishes The Window (title-page dated 1871), with music by Arthur Sullivan.
1872 (October) Publishes Gareth and Lynette [etc.]. The Imperial Library edition of the Works (1872–3) brings together the Idylls of the King (with a new Epilogue: To the Queen), virtually complete except for Balin and Balan (written 1874).
1873 (April) Again refuses offer of baronetcy, as also in 1874 and 1880.
1875 (June) Publishes Queen Mary, inaugurating his career as a playwright.
1876 (April) Production of Queen Mary.
(December) Publishes Harold (title-page dated 1877).
1878 (February) Marriage of his son Lionel to Eleanor Locker.
1879 (April) Death of his brother Charles Tennyson Turner.
(May) After repeated piracies, publishes The Lover’s Tale, which had been omitted from 1832.
(December) Production of The Falcon.
1880 (December) Publishes Ballads and Other Poems.
1881 (July) Henry Irving’s production of The Cup, with Ellen Terry and Irving.
1882 (November) Production of The Promise of May, his only published work in prose.
1883 (September) Visits Denmark with Gladstone.
Accepts the offer of a barony, taking his seat in the House of Lords in March 1884.
1884 (February) Publishes The Cup and The Falcon.
(June) Marriage of his son Hallam to Audrey Boyle.
(December) Publishes Becket.
1885 (November) Publishes Tiresias, and Other Poems.
1886 (April) Death of his son Lionel, aged thirty-two, returning from India.
(December) Publishes Locksley Hall Sixty Years After, which includes The Promise of May.
1888 Severe rheumatic illness, from which he does not recover till May 1889.
1889 (December) Publishes Demeter and Other Poems.
1890 (May) Makes a recording of some poems, by the kindness of Edison.
1892 (March) Production of The Foresters in New York.
(April) Publishes The Foresters. Irving at last agrees to produce Becket (acted February 1892).
(July) His last illness.
(6 October) Dies at Aldworth.
(28 October) Posthumous publication of The Death of Œnone, Akbar’s Dream, and Other Poems.