1770 born April 7 to John and Anne (Cookson) Wordsworth, second of five.
1778 mother dies; William goes to Hawkshead Grammar School.
1783 father dies.
1787 goes up to St. John's College, Cambridge.
1789 An Evening Walk .
1790 walking tour of France, Switzerland, and Germany.
1791 graduates; goes to France; meets and has an affair with Annette Vallon.
1792 (illegitimate) daughter Caroline born.
1793 returns to England to earn money; Anglo-French War prevents his return to France until 1802. Descriptive Sketches.
1794 reunited with Dorothy.
1795 inherits legacy of £900. Meets Coleridge.
1797 William and his sister Dorothy move to Alfoxden to be near Coleridge.
1798 Lyrical Ballads .
1798-99 The Wordsworths travel to Germany with Coleridge.
1799 William and Dorothy settle in the Lake district, at Dove Cottage, Grasmere.
1800 Lyrical Ballads revised, Preface added.
1802 visits the Vallons at Calais. After receiving a much-delayed inheritance, marries Mary Hutchinson. Sonnets Dedicated to National Independence and Liberty.
1803 son John born. (Four more children by 1810.)
1805 The Prelude finished. Brother John lost at sea.
1807 Poems in Two Volumes
1809 The Convention of Cintra.
1810 quarrel with Coleridge.
1812 children Thomas and Caroline die.
1813 moves to Rydal Mount, between Grasmere and Rydal Water; appointed Distributor of Stamps for Westmorland (£400/year).
1814 The Excursion
1815 The White Doe of Rylstone; Preface to Lyrical Ballads revised.
1819 Peter Bell and The Waggoner.
1820 We Are Seven and The River Duddon (sonnets).
1822 Ecclesiastical Sketches
1825 Yarrow Revisited, and Other Poems.
1828 tours the Rhineland with Coleridge.
1839 Oxford confers honorary Doctor of Civil Law degree.
1842 Poems, Chiefly of Early and Late Years.
1843 named Poet Laureate.
1847 daughter Dora dies.
1850 dies (April 23). The Prelude
Incorporated in the Victorian Web July 2000