1812 7th February: Charles Dickens is born at 387, Mile End Terrace, in Landport, Portsmouth.

1817 The Dickens family moves to Chatham, where Charles attends school for the first time.

1822 His father is sent to London. The family moves from Chatham to a modest place at Camden Town. His economic situation worsens and John Dickens is arrested under charges of debt. The family settles down with him in Marshalsea, a prison for debtors. Charles is sent to work at the Warren bitumen factory, where he stays for about six months.

1824 Dickens renews his studies at Wellington House Academy.

1827 He finds a job as a clerk at an Attorneys´ Office. During the afternoons, he studies shorthand.

1829 He meets Maria Beadnell, daughter of a Londoner banker with whom he falls in love. The following two years he works as a shorthand typist in Doctors´ Commons. He spends his spare time reading at the British Museum.

1832 He begins his career as a Journalist, writing articles for the True Sun and parliamentary reports for The Mirror of Parliament.

1833 December: A Dickens work is first published in the Monthly Magazine.

1834 August: he works as a parliamentary reporter in the Morning Chronicle and for the first time makes use of the pseudonym "Boz".

1835 Dickens becomes famous as a parliamentary journalist and political correspondent. He travels around the country to attend public ceremonies and makes friends with William Harrison Ainsworth, who introduces him to Macrone, his first Editor.

1836 February: Sketches by Boz is published.
April: The Pickwick Papers was first published with overwhelming success. Dickens marries Catherine Hogarth. He leaves his post in the Morning Chronicle to devote himself to novel writing.

1837 May: Death of Mary Hogarth, Dickens´s sister-in-law.

1838 Oliver Twist is published by Dickens and is hugely successful.

1839 Nicholas Nickleby is published. Dickens´s fame increases. He makes new friends and joins the London Literary Society.

1840 Dickens creates Master Humphrey´s Clock, a weekly periodical in which The Antique Shop and Barnaby Rudge are first published.

1842 January-June: Dickens visits the United States, where he is warmly welcomed but finds the country disappointing.
October: American Notes is published causing a great stir in America.

1843 Martin Chuzzlewitt and A Christmas Carroll is published. Dickens and his family leave the country and settle down in Genoa.

1844 December: Dickens travels to London to read to his friends The Bells and later on returns to the continent.

1845 Dickens and his family visit Italy and France before returning to England. Dickens and Forster perform with charity purposes in Cada cual según su humor, by Johnson.

1846 January: The Daily News, directed by Dickens, is first published. Three weeks later, he resigns as Director and goes abroad. He settles with his family in Lausanne and later on in Paris, where he meets some famous French writers.
Dickens writes Dombey & Son and A Christmas Carroll, engages in social, philanthropic and journalistic activities, and stages theatrical performances of amateurs, in which he also participates as an actor.

1849 May: David Copperfield, Dickens´s favourite novel and, probably, the most outstanding one, is first published.

1850 March: Household Words is first published.

1851 May: Dickens and his theatrical company of amateurs perform for the Queen and the Prince Consort at Devonshire House, in London. Dickens moves to Tavistock House, in Bloomsbury.

1852 The Haunted House is first published.

1853 Dickens spends the summer in Boulogne, where he writes the last numbers of The Haunted House. In October, he visits Italy again with Wilkie Collins and Augustus Egg.

1854 Hard Times is published. Dickens spends another summer in Boulogne.

1855 February: Dickens meets again Maria Beadnell, now Mrs. Winter.
November: he travels to Paris, where he stays for six months.
December: Little Dorrit is first published.

1856 Dickens once again gets in touch with the literary and artistic Paris media.
March: Purchase of Gad´s Hill Place, his eventual permanent residence.
June: once again he settles down in Boulogne to spend the summer.

1857 January: The Frozen Deep by Wilkie Collins is performed at Tavistock House.
30th June: Dickens makes his first public reading at St. Martin´s Hall, London.

1858 Dickens falls in love with Ellen Ternan and separates from his wife.
10th June: A personal declaration concerning his private life is printed on the first page of Household Words.
He quarrells with Thackeray, due to the "Yates case."

1859 A Tale of Two Cities is published. Dickens founds a new periodical All the Year Round. For the following eleven years, he travels throughout the country making public readings of his works.

1860 Great Expectations is first published.

1864 Our Mutual Friend is first published.

1865 June: Dickens appears among the victims of the railway accident at Staplehurst, although he suffers no physical injury. Since then, his health begins to deteriorate fast.

1867 Dickens visits the United States once again and is absolutely successful in his public readings. He is the guest of honour of the New York Press Club.

1868 May: Dickens returns to England.

1869 Makes more public readings in England and attends many social meetings.

1870 March: Dickens makes his last public reading in London, and Queen Victoria grants him an audience.
April: the first issue of The Mystery of Edwin Drood is published and Dickens makes his last public appearance at a dinner organized by the Royal Academy.
8th June: Dickens suffers a brain haemorrhage at Gad´s Hill Place and dies the following day.
14th June: he is buried in Poet´s Corner, in Westminster Abbey.


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