*1888
September 26: Thomas Stearns Eliot born in St. Louis, Missouri to Henry Ware and Charlotte Stearns Eliot.
1898
A student at Smith Academy in St. Louis
1905
To Milton Academy in Massachusetts
1906-10
Undergraduate years at Harvard. Reads Symons’s The Symbolist Movement in Literature and the poetry of Laforgue.
Studies with George Santayana and Irving Babbitt.
1910-11
Having finished BA and MA degrees at Harvard, spends a year at the Sorbonne in Paris. In the summer of 1911, finishes a version
of "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"
1911-14
Returns to Harvard to study philosophy as a graduate student. Begins doctoral thesis on F.H. Bradley.
1914
To England on fellowship; meets Ezra Pound.
*1915
Marries Vivien Haigh-Wood on June 26th; begins publishing poems that later appear in the Prufrock volume.
*1916
Eliot working as teacher at Highgate Junior School and as University Extension Lecturer.
*1917
Prufrock and Other Observation published. Eliot takes a position at Lloyds Bank in the Colonial and Foreign Department.
1919
Ara Vos Prec published, with "Gerontion" and the poems later published in Poems – 1920. "Tradition and the
Individual Talent" appears in The Egoist.
1920
The Sacred Wood published.
*1921 Ill
and exhausted, Eliot takes leave from Lloyds Bank. Recuperating at Margate and Lausanne, finishes the drafts of The Waste
Land, which he then shows to Pound.
*1922
The Waste Land published. First issue of Criterion appears.
1925
Poems 1909-1925 published (with "The Hollow Men"). Eliot joins the publishing house of Faber & Gwyer, leaves Lloyds
bank.
1927 Enters
the Church of England and assumes British citizenship
1928
For Lancelot Andrewes published.
1930
Ash-Wednesday published.
1932 Selected
Essays 1917-1932
1933
Eliot’s 1932-33 Norton lectures at Harvard published under the title The Use of Poetry and the Use of Criticism
(1933). At the University of Virginia, he delivers the lectures later published as After Strange Gods (1934). Obtains
legal separation from Vivien.
1934 The
Rock: A Pageant Play performed and published.
1935
Murder in the Cathedral performed.
1936 Collected
Poems 1909-1935 (first appearance of "Burnt Norton").
1939 The
Family Reunion performed. The Idea of a Christian Society published. Last issue of Criterion. Publishes
Old Possums book of Practical Cats, which was later turned into a musical in 1981 and preformed on Broadway from 1982-2000.
1940
East Coker published.
1941
The Dry Salvages published.
1942
Little Gidding published.
*1947
Vivien Eliot dies.
*1948
Wins Nobel Prize for Literature. Notes Towards the Definition of Culture published.
1949 The
Cocktail Party performed.
1953
The Confidential Clerk performed.
*1957
Married Valerie Fletcher on January 10. On Poetry and Poets published.
1958
The Elder Statesman performed.
1963
Collected Poems 1909-1962.
*1965
Dies on January 4th; his ashes to East Coker.
