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Chronology
N.B.
Dates are given according to the Julian calendar(or Old Style),
which was retained in Russia until the 1917 Revolution and
ran twelve days behind the Gregorian calendar during the nineteenth
century.
1821
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoevsky is born in Moscow on October
30 in Hospital for the poor, the second of seven children.
1831-37
Fyodor and his older brother, Mikhail (b. 1820), together
attend boarding schools in Moscow. Following the death of
their mother in 1837, they are sent to a preparatory school
in St. Petersburg.
1838
Fyodor, but not Mikhail, is admitted to St. Petersburg’s Academy
of Military Engineers.
1839
Father possibly murdered by his own serfs at his estate, Chermashnya,
in province of Tula.
1843
Dostoevsky graduates from the Academy as lieutenant. Translates
into Russian Honore de Balzac’s Eugenie Grandet.
1844
He translates George Sand’s La derniere Aldini and
works on Poor Folk, his own first novel.
1845
Friendship with the liberal Vissarion Grigorievich Belinsky,
Russia’s most influential critic.
1846
Publication of Poor Folk, The Double (appearing
two weeks later), and Mr. Prokharchin. Acquaintance
with the utopian socialist M. V. Butashevich-Petrashevsky
1846
Anna Grigorievna Snitkina (Dostoevsky’s future wife) is born
in Petersburg on October 30th.
1846-47
Various undiagnosed nervous ailments. Onset of epilepsy?
1847
Publication of A Novel in Nine Letters, as well as
several short stories, including A Weak Heart, Polzunkov,
The Landlady and White Nights.
1848
Publication of The Stranger-Woman, Christmas and
Wedding, and A Jealous Husband.
1849
Publication of Netochka Nezvanova. Arrested and convicted
for alleged political crimes. Sentenced to death, but due
to a last-minute reprieve, was instead sentenced to an indefinite
term in Siberia, including four years hard labour.
1850-54
Penal labour in Omsk, in western Siberia.
1853
Onset of periodic epileptic seizures.
1854-59
Compulsory military service in Semipalatinsk (southwest Siberia).
Marriage to the widowed Marya Dmitrievna Isaeva in 1857. The
couple are permitted to take up residence in European Russia
in 1859, the year in which Uncle’s Dream, The Little
Hero (composed in prison) and The Village of Stepanchikovo
and Its Inhabitants appear.
1860
Publication of the first part of House of the Dead.
1861
Mikhail and Fyordor begin publication of Time, which publishes
Dostoevsky’s The Insulted and the Injured, and A
Silly Story.
1862
The second part of House of the Dead and A Nasty
Tale are published in Time. Dostoevsky makes his first
trip abroad, visiting several western European countries,
including England, France and Switzerland. Beginning of liaison
with Apollinaria (Polina) Suslova.
1863
Winter Notes on Summer Impressions is published in
Time.
1864
Epoch, successor to the banned magazine Time, publishes Dostoevsky’s
Notes from Underground. Death of Marya Dmitrievna,
Fyodor’s wife, and of his brother Mikhail.
1865
Epoch ceases publication, ending Dostoevsky’s five-year journalistic
career. An Unusual Happening is published. Polina Suslova
declines his marriage proposal.
1866
Crime and Punishment and The Gambler are published.
1867
Dostoevsky is married to Anna Grigorievna Snitkina. The couple
leave for western Europe, remaining abroad for four years.
They live in Geneva for a time, then Florence, Vienna, Prague
and finally Dresden.
1868
Publication of The Idiot.
1870
Publication of The Eternal Husband.
1871-72
The Dostoevskys move back to Russia and Petersburg where The
Devils is published serially.
1873
Dostoevsky’s The Diary of a Writer becomes a regular
feature of the conservative weekly, The Citizen. Publication
of Bubok.
1874
Dostoevsky arrested and imprisoned once again, this time for
violation of censorship regulations.
1875
Publication of A Raw Youth.
1876
Dostoevsky becomes sole editor of a new monthly periodical
entitled The Diary of a Writer, in which A Gentle
Creature appears.
1877
Publication of The Dream of a Ridiculous Man.
1879-80
Publication of The Brothers Karamazov. Anna opens a
direct-mail book service.
1880
Dostoevsky delivers his famous speech on Pushkin at the Pushkin
festivities in Moscow in June. Enormous crowds and stormy
emotional responses at Dostoevsky’s readings.
1881
Dostoevsky dies from a lung hemorrage in St. Petersburg on
January 28 at the age of fifty-nine. Buried February 1st in
cemetery of Alexander Nevsky Monastery.
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