Christian History timeline: Chesterton’s literary life
Phase I: SPIRITUAL SEEKER
LIFE
1874 Born May 29
1881 Family moves to new home at Number 11, Warwick Gardens, Kensington
1887 Enrolls as a day student at St. Paul’s Preparatory School
Begins writing and sketching in journals
1892 Enters Slade School of Art and University College
1893 Experiences metaphysical crisis
1895 Leaves college without a degree, takes job at publishing firm
1896 Meets, falls in love with Frances Blogg
1900 Meets Hilaire Belloc
1901 Marries Frances Blogg
1904 Declines chair of literature at Birmingham University Meets John O'Connor, model for Father Brown
WORK
1891—3 Contributions to The Debater, the informal organ of the Junior Debating Club
1892 Short piece, “The Song of Labour,” in The Speaker
1899 Begins to write for London’s Daily News
1900 Poetry, Greybeards at Play and The Wild Knight and Other Poems
1901 Begins regular Saturday column for Daily News
1903 Commissioned to write “English Men of Letters” series, including biographies of Robert Browning, Thomas Carlyle, Leo Tolstoy, Thackeray, and Tennyson
1903—4 Debates Robert Blatchford in pages of The Clarion
1904 Novel, The Napoleon of Notting Hill
Phase II: UNEASY ANGLICAN LIFE
1905 Accepts invitation to preach at St. Paul’s Church, Covent Garden
Enters 30—year public debate with George Bernard Shaw
1909 Friend Maurice Baring becomes a Roman Catholic
1912 Begins to build “Top Meadow,” a studio that eventually becomes the Chesterton home
1913 Younger brother, Cecil, becomes a Roman Catholic
1914 Falls seriously ill
1918 Cecil dies in war
1919—20 Travels with Frances to Jerusalem, the Continent, and North America
WORK
1905 Apologetics, Heretics Story collection, The Club of Queer Trades
Begins weekly articles for The Illustrated London news
1906 Biography, Charles Dickens
1908 Aposlogetics, Orthodoxy
Novel, The Man Who Was Thursday
Essays, All Things Considered
1909 Novel, The Ball and the Cross
Biography, George Bernard Shaw
Essays, Tremendous Trifles
1910 Essays, What’s Wrong with the World and Alarms and Discursions
1911 Mystery collection, The Innocence of Father Brown
Criticism, Appreciations and Criticisms of the Work of Charles Dickens
Ballads, Lepanto and The Ballad of the White Horse
1912 Novel, Manalive
Essays, A Miscellany of Men
1913 Criticism, The Victorian Age in Literature
Play, Magic
1914 Mystery collection, The Wisdom of Father Brown
Novel, The Flying Inn
Commentary, The Barbarianism of Berlin and The Appetite of Tyranny
1915 Commentary, The Crimes of England
1917 History, A Short History of England
Commentary, Eugenics and Other Evils
1919 Travel, Irish Impressions
1920 Travel, The New Jerusalem
1921 Essays, The Uses of Diversity
1922 Mystery collection, The Man Who Knew Too Much
Travel, What I Saw in America
Phase III: ROMAN CATHOLIC LIFE
1922 Enters the Roman Catholic Church
1925 Launches G. K.’s Weekly, the official publication for the Distributist League
1926 Frances joins Catholic Church
1929 Joins the Detection Club
1932 Begins regular BBC broadcasts on literary subjects
1934 Made Knight Commander with Star, Order of St. Gregory the Great
1936 Dies June 14
WORK
1923 Biography, St. Francis of Assisi
Essays, Fancies Versus Fads
1925 Verse, Wine, Water, and Song
Verse, Collected Poems
Story collection, Tales of the Long Bow
Religious history, The Everlasting Man
1926 Mystery collection, The Incredulity of Father Brown
Theology, The Catholic Church and Conversion
Commentary, the Outline of Sanity
1927 Mystery collection, The Secret of Father Brown
Novel, The Return of Don Quixote
1928 Essays, Generally Speaking
1929 Story collection, The Poet and the Lunatics
Theology, The Thing: Why I Am a Catholic
1930 Mystery collection, Four Faultless Felons
Travel, The Resurrection of Rome
1931 Essays, Come to Think of It …
1932 Biography/criticism, Chaucer
1933 Biography, St. Thomas Aquinas
Essays, All I Survey
1934 Essays, Avowals and Denials
1935 Mystery collection, The Scandal of Father Brown
Commentary, The Well and the Shallows
1936 Autobiography
CONTEMPORARY EVENTS
1874 P.M. Benjamin Disraeli initiates social reforms
1899 Boers’ pre-emptive strike sparks war with Britain
1901 Queen Victoria dies
1912 Titanic sinks
1914 Start of World War I
1917 Bolshevik Revolution begins
1920 Prohibition passes in America
1929 Wall Street plunge kicks off the Great Depression
1933 Adolf Hitler named chancellor of Germany
By the Editors
[Christian History originally published this article in Christian History Issue #75 in 2002]
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