. Stowe:
Uncle Tom’s Cabin
(to 1852).
1852
Enlists officially in the army.
Childhood
published in
The Contemporary
.
Death of Gogol. Dickens:
Bleak House
(to 1853).
1853
During campaigns in the Caucasus writes
Boyhood
and stories of army life. Writes
A Christmas Night
. Publishes
The Raid
.
Ostrovsky’s first play produced.
1854
Promoted to ensign and transferred to Crimea.
Boyhood
appears in
The Contemporary
.
1855
Publishes
A Billiard-Marker’s Notes, Sevastopol in December, Sevastopol in May, The Wood-Felling
. Returns to St Petersburg.
Trollope:
The Warden
.
1856
Death of his brother Dmitri. Publishes
Sevastopol in August, The Snow Storm, Two Hussars, Meeting a Moscow Acquaintance, A Landlord’s Morning
. Resigns from the army, returns to Yasnaya Polyana.
Aksakov:
A Family Chronicle
.
Turgenev:
Rudin
.
Nekrasov:
Poems
.
1857
Visits France and Switzerland. Publishes
Youth, Lucerne
.
Flaubert:
Madame Bovary
. Trollope:
Barchester Towers
. Birth of Conrad.
1858
Visits St Petersburg. Publishes
Albert
.
Pisemsky:
A Thousand Souls
.
1859
Publishes
Three Deaths, Family Happiness
. Critical enthusiasm more muted than for his earlier works. Starts an experimental school for the peasants at Yasnaya Polyana.
Goncharov:
Oblomov
. Turgenev:
A Nest of the Gentlefolk
.
Ostrovsky:
The Storm
.
Eliot:
Adam Bede
.
Darwin:
The Origin of Species
.
HISTORICAL EVENTS
Russian intervention in Hungary.
Dostoevsky sentenced to forced labour in Siberia.
Great Exhibition in London.
St Petersburg-Moscow Railway opened.
France: Second Empire established.
Turkey declares war on Russia.
Crimean War begins.
Death of Tsar Nicholas I. Accession of Alexander II.
Crimean War ends.
Indian Mutiny.
Committees set up to prepare the gentry for the Emancipation of the serfs from private ownership.
Russia acquires Amur and Maritime Provinces from China.
Russian conquest of Caucasus completed: surrender of Shamil.
DATE
AUTHOR’S LIFE
LITERARY CONTEXT
1860
Second (and last) visit to western Europe. Death of his brother Nikolai, in France. Visits Rome.
Turgenev:
On the Eve, First Love
.
Eliot:
The Mill on the Floss
.
Dickens:
Great Expectations
(to 1861).
Chekhov born.
1861
Visits Paris, London, Brussels. Back in Russia, quarrels with Turgenev. Serves as Arbiter of the Peace. Resumes school work at Yasnaya Polyana.
Dostoevsky:
The House of the Dead
.
Herzen:
My Past and Thoughts
(to 1867).
1862
Starts publication of educational magazine. Gives up being Arbiter of the Peace. Police raid on his house. Marries Sofya Andreyevna Behrs, daughter of a court physician. Closes the school.
Turgenev:
Fathers and Children
.
Hugo:
Les Misérables
.
Flaubert:
Salammbô
.
1863
Publishes
The Cossacks, Polikushka
. Sergei born (first of thirteen children).
Death of Thackeray.
Chernyshevsky:
What is to be Done?
1864
Dostoevsky:
Notes from Underground
.
Nekrasov:
Who can Live Happy in Russia?
(to 1876).
Dickens:
Our Mutual Friend
(to 1865).
1865–6
Publishes
1805
(volumes 1 and 2 of
War and Peace
).
Leskov:
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk
.
1866
Unsuccessful defence of soldier court-martialled for striking an officer.
Dostoevsky:
Crime and Punishment
.
1867
War and Peace
volume 3 published.
Turgenev:
Smoke
.
1868
War and Peace
volume 4 published.
Dostoevsky:
The Idiot
. Gorky born.
1869
War and Peace
volumes 5 and 6 published. Experiences acute fear of death in a hotel room at Arzamas.
Goncharov:
The Precipice
.
1870
Begins a novel about Peter the Great. Starts learning Ancient Greek.
Death of Dickens, Herzen. Kuprin born.
1871
Dostoevsky:
Demons
(to 1872).
1872
Reopens Yasnaya Polyana school. Poor health. Reading philosophers notably Schopenhauer. Writes
A Prisoner in the Caucasus, God sees the Truth but Waits
.
Leskov:
Cathedral Folk
.
HISTORICAL EVENTS
Vladivostok founded.
Italy: Garibaldi captures Naples and Sicily.
Emancipation of the serfs.
American Civil War begins. Lincoln President of the USA.
Bismarck becomes Prime Minister of Prussia.
American slaves freed.
Polish Rebellion crushed.
Zemstva and trial by jury introduced in Russia.
First International formed in London.
Russia captures Tashkent.
American Civil War ends.
First attempt on the life of Alexander II.
Russia captures Samarkand and Bukhara.
Franco-Prussian War. End of Second Empire; Third Republic inaugurated in France.
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov (Lenin) born.
Paris Commune.