16 Facts About Paul Verlaine

Paul-Marie Verlaine was a French poet associated with the Symbolist movement and the Decadent movement.

Paul Verlaine is considered one of the greatest representatives of the fin de siecle in international and French poetry.

Paul Verlaine began writing poetry at an early age, and was initially influenced by the Parnassien movement and its leader, Leconte de Lisle.

Paul Verlaine's first published poem was published in 1863 in La Revue du progres, a publication founded by poet Louis-Xavier de Ricard.

Paul Verlaine was a frequenter of the salon of the Marquise de Ricard at 10 Boulevard des Batignolles and other social venues, where he rubbed shoulders with prominent artistic figures of the day: Anatole France, Emmanuel Chabrier, inventor-poet and humorist Charles Cros, the cynical anti-bourgeois idealist Villiers de l'Isle-Adam, Theodore de Banville, Francois Coppee, Jose-Maria de Heredia, Leconte de Lisle, Catulle Mendes and others.

Paul Verlaine's first published collection, Poemes saturniens, though adversely commented upon by Sainte-Beuve, established him as a poet of promise and originality.

At the proclamation of the Third Republic in the same year, Paul Verlaine joined the 160th battalion of the Garde nationale, turning Communard on 18 March 1871.

Paul Verlaine became head of the press bureau of the Central Committee of the Paris Commune.

Paul Verlaine escaped the deadly street fighting known as the Bloody Week, or Semaine Sanglante, and went into hiding in the Pas-de-Calais.

Paul Verlaine returned to Paris in August 1871, and, in September, received the first letter from Arthur Rimbaud, who admired his poetry.

Paul Verlaine urged Rimbaud to come to Paris, and by 1872, he had lost interest in Mathilde, and effectively abandoned her and their son, preferring the company of Rimbaud, who was by now his lover.

Paul Verlaine returned to France in 1877 and, while teaching English at a school in Rethel, fell in love with one of his pupils, Lucien Letinois, who inspired Paul Verlaine to write further poems.

Paul Verlaine was devastated when Letinois died of typhus in 1883.

Paul Verlaine lived in slums and public hospitals, and spent his days drinking absinthe in Paris cafes.

Paul Verlaine's poetry was admired and recognized as ground-breaking, and served as a source of inspiration to composers.

Paul Verlaine died in Paris at the age of 51 on 8 January 1896; he was buried in the Cimetiere des Batignolles.