| Timeline |
| 1770 |
Born 7 April in Lake District |
| 1777 |
Mother dies, separated from sister Dorothy and attends Hawkshead Grammar School |
| 1783 |
Father dies |
| 1787 |
Attends St. John's College, Cambridge |
| 1789 |
An Evening Walk published |
| 1790 |
Walking tour of France, Switzerland, and Germany |
| 1791 |
Degree from Cambridge; returns to France |
| 1792 |
Illegitimate daughter Caroline born |
| 1793 |
Descriptive Sketches published |
| 1794 |
Reunited with Dorothy |
| 1795 |
Meets Coleridge, inherits legacy of £900 |
| 1795 |
Moves form London to Dorset; Dorothy (his sister) joins him and they never live apart again
|
| 1798 |
Lyrical Ballads published anonymously |
| 1798 |
Spends winter in Germany with Dorothy |
| 1799 |
Settles at Dove Cottage, Grasmere |
| 1802 |
Marries, 4 October, Mary Hutchinson |
| 1803 |
Son John born |
| 1804 |
Finishes "Intimations Ode"
|
| 1805 |
Elegiac Stanzas published |
| 1807 |
Poems, in two volumes |
| 1812 |
Two of his children die |
| 1813 |
Settles at Rydal Mount |
| 1814 |
The Excursion published |
| 1815 |
Collected Poems |
| 1819 |
Peter Bell and The Waggoner |
| 1822 |
Ecclesiastical Sketches published |
| 1825 |
Yarrow Revisited, and Other Poems |
| 1828 |
Tours the Rhineland with Coleridge |
| 1842 |
Poems, Chiefly of Early and Late Years published |
| 1843 |
Succeeds Southey as poet laureate |
| 1850 |
The Prelude publish |
| 1850 |
Dies at Rydal Mount 23 April |
