3 Dec 1908
|
Balchin born in Potterne, Wiltshire
|
1918
|
Starts at Dauntsey’s School
|
1 Nov 1927
|
Matriculates at Peterhouse, Cambridge
|
24 June 1930
|
Graduates with BA (Hons) in Natural Sciences
|
18 Aug 1930
|
Begins work for the National Institute of Industrial Psychology
|
Jan 1933
|
Launch of Black Magic chocolates, with which Balchin was heavily involved
|
21 Jan 1933
|
Balchin marries Elisabeth Evelyn Walshe
|
1934
|
Publication of Balchin’s first two books: No Sky (a novel) and How To Run a Bassoon Factory (non-fiction)
|
16 Sept 1934
|
Birth of Prudence, Balchin’s first daughter
|
8 Feb 1935
|
Leaves NIIP to join Rowntree’s
|
19 Nov 1937
|
Birth of Penelope, Balchin’s second daughter
|
Sept 1939
|
Joins Manufacturing Confectioners Alliance as Allocations Officer
|
July 1940
|
Joins Economics Division of Ministry of Food
|
2 Aug 1941
|
Joins the army’s Directorate of Selection of Personnel as a captain
|
9 Nov 1942
|
Publication of Darkness Falls from the Air, Balchin’s first genuinely successful novel
|
31 Dec 1942
|
Joins the army’s Directorate of Biological Research and is promoted to lieutenant-colonel
|
6 Dec 1943
|
Publication of The Small Back Room, Balchin’s most successful novel
|
9 Dec 1943
|
Transferred to the department of the Scientific Adviser to the Army Council
|
26 Dec 1944
|
Birth of Freja, Balchin’s third daughter
|
7 May 1945
|
Appointed Deputy Scientific Adviser to the Army Council with the rank of brigadier
|
Sept 1945
|
Publication of Mine Own Executioner, Balchin’s second most successful novel
|
21 Feb 1949
|
UK release of the famous Powell and Pressburger film of The Small Back Room
|
30 Mar 1951
|
Balchin divorces Elisabeth
|
June 1951
|
Publication of A Way Through the Wood, Balchin’s fictional response to the collapse of his marriage
|
5 Feb 1953
|
Balchin marries Yovanka Zorana Tomich
|
5 Sept 1955
|
Publication of The Fall of the Sparrow, Balchin’s last great novel
|
27 Dec 1955
|
Birth of Charles, Balchin’s first son
|
11 July 1957
|
Awarded BAFTA for ‘Best British Screenplay’ for his script for The Man Who Never Was
|
1959
|
Writes three draft screenplays for the Richard Burton/Liz Taylor version of Cleopatra
|
24 May 1962
|
Birth of Cassandra, Balchin’s first daughter with Yovanka
|
Oct 1967
|
Publication of Kings of Infinite Space, Balchin’s final novel
|
17 May 1970
|
Balchin dies after a heart attack at the Greenaway Nursing Home in Hampstead
|
Apr 1974
|
Clive James writes long critical appraisal of Balchin in The New Review
|
Oct 2005
|
UK release of Separate Lies, Julian Fellowes’ film adaptation of A Way Through the Wood
|
Apr 2008
|
BBC Radio 4 broadcast ‘The Small Back Room Boy’, a documentary about Balchin
|
1 Sept 2015
|
Publication of His Own Executioner: The Life of Nigel Balchin by Derek Collett, the first biography of Balchin
|