Born inMetz to apetit-bourgeois family, Verlaine bore a lifelong interest in the arts, whether literary, musical or visual. His début collection,Poèmes saturniens (1866), were released at the age of twenty-two; they were published byAlphonse Lemerre. Verlaine's tempestuous sexual relationship with young poetArthur Rimbaud (ten years his junior and under eighteen years, and while he himself had a wife and infant son), a member of theZutistes, aroused great controversy; the couple peregrinated throughout England and Belgium until their split in 1873, which was caused by him wounding Rimbaud with arevolver. Following trial, Verlaine was sentenced to two years in prison forbattery andsodomy. During his sentence, Verlaine reverted to practisingCatholicism and composedSagesse (published 1880),Jadis et naguère (published 1884) andParallèlement (published 1889). As his reputation grew, he became increasingly haunted by guilt and paranoia, lapsing into depression, alcohol and chemical abuse and disease, culminating in his death inParis from acutepneumonia.
Revered for his lyrical sensibility and subtle nuance, Verlaine is acknowledged as one of the archetypicalpoètes maudits ('accursed poets'), a turn-of-phrase he popularised but did not coin. His promise was evident even in his early work: his engagement with musicality, fluidity, wordplay, polysemy and prosodical manipulation attracted many admirers. His diverse œuvre is highly eclectic, exploiting the characteristics of theFrench language; critics have noted interplays with melancholy and 'chiaroscuro', as well as a pioneering of metaphor and allegory. Beyond his apparent elegance and mellifluity is a profound introspection, resonating with many contemporary artists of his time, including those outside the literary sphere (such asImpressionist painters).
Verlaine's birthplace inMetz, today a museum dedicated to his life and œuvre
Verlaine was born in 2 rue de la Haute-Pierre inMetz,Grand Est, to devout Catholics Nicolas-Auguste Verlaine (born inBertrix, Belgium) and Élisa-Stéphanie Dehée. The couple were married for thirteen years, and Dehée miscarried thrice beforehand. They baptised their son Paul-Marie out of gratitude to the VirginMary for his survival. He was their only biological child; however, he had an elder stepsister (his orphaned cousin) who was adopted in 1836, Élisa.
He was educated at theLycée Impérial Bonaparte (now theLycée Condorcet) in Paris and then took up a post in thecivil service. He spent part of his childhood in the Batignolles district of Paris, particularly at 10 rue Nollet, where he lived with his family.[2] He began writing poetry at an early age, and was initially influenced by theParnassien movement and its leader,Leconte de Lisle. Verlaine's first published poem was published in 1863 inLa Revue du progrès, a publication founded by poetLouis-Xavier de Ricard. Verlaine was a frequenter of the salon of the Marquise de Ricard[3] (Louis-Xavier de Ricard's mother) 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 humoristCharles Cros, the cynical anti-bourgeois idealistVilliers de l'Isle-Adam,Théodore de Banville,François Coppée,Jose-Maria de Heredia, Leconte de Lisle,Catulle Mendes and others. Verlaine's first published collection,Poèmes saturniens (1866),[4] though adversely commented upon bySainte-Beuve, established him as a poet of promise and originality.
Mathilde Sophie Marie Mauté de Fleurville (17 April 1853 – 13 November 1914), who was born inNogent-le-Rotrou and died inNice, married Verlaine on 11 August 1870 atNotre-Dame de Clignancourt. Mauté was a writer herself.
At the proclamation of theThird Republic in the same year, Verlaine joined the 160th battalion of theGarde nationale, turningCommunard on 18 March 1871.
Verlaine became head of the press bureau of the Central Committee of theParis Commune. Verlaine escaped the deadly street fighting known as the Bloody Week, orSemaine sanglante, and went into hiding in thePas-de-Calais.[citation needed]
Caricature of Rimbaud drawn by Verlaine in 1872Plaque inBrussels marking the building where Verlaine shot RimbaudBy the table, an 1872 painting byHenri Fantin-Latour. Verlaine is on the far left and Rimbaud is at the second to the left.
Verlaine returned to Paris in August 1871, and, in September, received the first letter from fellow poetArthur Rimbaud, who admired his poetry. 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.[4] Rimbaud and Verlaine's stormy affair took them to London in 1872.
In Brussels on July 12, 1873, in a drunken, jealous rage, Verlaine fired two shots with a pistol at his lover, Rimbaud, wounding his left wrist, though not seriously injuring the poet. As an indirect result of this incident, Verlaine was arrested and imprisoned atMons for one year and six months,[5] where he underwent a re-conversion toRoman Catholicism, which again influenced his work and provoked Rimbaud's sharp criticism.[6]
The poems collected inRomances sans paroles (1874) were written between 1872 and 1873, inspired by Verlaine's nostalgically coloured recollections of his life with Mathilde on the one hand and impressionistic sketches of his on-again off-again year-long escapade with Rimbaud on the other.Romances sans paroles was published while Verlaine was imprisoned. Following his release from prison, Verlaine again travelled to England, where he worked for some years as a teacher, teaching French, Latin, Greek and drawing atWilliam Lovell's school inStickney in Lincolnshire.[7]
From there he went to teach in nearbyBoston, before moving toBournemouth.[8] While in England, he produced another successful collection,Sagesse. Verlaine returned to France in 1877 and, while teaching English at a school inRethel, fell in love with one of his pupils, Lucien Létinois, who inspired Verlaine to write further poems.[9] Verlaine was devastated when Létinois died oftyphus in 1883.
Verlaine's last years saw his descent intodrug addiction,alcoholism, and poverty. He lived in slums and public hospitals, and spent his days drinkingabsinthe in Paris cafés. However, the people's love for his art resurrected support and brought in an income for Verlaine: his early poetry was rediscovered, his lifestyle and strange behaviour in front of crowds attracted admiration, and in 1894 he was elected France's "Prince of Poets" by his peers.
Verlaine's drug dependence and alcoholism took a toll on his life. He died in Paris at the age of 51 on 8 January 1896; he was buried in theCimetière des Batignolles (he was first buried in the 20th division, but his grave was moved to the 11th division—on the roundabout, a much better location—when theBoulevard Périphérique was built).[13]
A bust monument to Verlaine sculpted byRodo was erected in 1911. It sits in theLuxembourg Gardens in Paris.
In poetry, the symbolist procedure—as typified by Verlaine—was to use subtle suggestion instead of precise statement (rhetoric was banned) and to evoke moods and feelings through the magic of words and repeated sounds and the cadence of verse (musicality) andmetrical innovation.
Verlaine described his typically decadent style in great detail in his poem "Art Poétique," describing the primacy of musicality and the importance of elusiveness and "the Odd." He spoke of veils and nuance and implored poets to "Keep away from the murderous Sharp Saying, Cruel Wit, and Impure Laugh." It is with these lyrical veils in mind that Verlaine concluded by suggesting that a poem should be a "happy occurrence."[14]
An example of Verlaine's subtle use of rhyme, puns and imagery is the untranslatable stanza: "Il pleure dans mon coeur / comme il pleut sur la ville. / Quelle est cette langueur / qui pénètre mon coeur ?" This phrase begins with aportmanteau between "Je pleure" (I am crying) and "Il pleut" (It's raining) and continues by carrying through both the emotion and the vowel sound of the "eu" common to "pleure" and "pleut."
Verlaine'sChanson d'automne as awall-poem inLeiden, Netherlands
In preparation forOperation Overlord, theBBC viaRadio Londres had signaled to theFrench Resistance that the opening lines of the 1866 Verlaine poem "Chanson d'automne" were to indicate the start of D-Day operations. The first three lines of the poem, "Les sanglots longs /Des violons /De l'automne" ("Long sobs of autumn violins"), meant that Operation Overlord was to start within two weeks. These lines were broadcast on 1 June 1944. The next set of lines, "Blessent mon coeur /D'une langueur /Monotone" ("wound my heart with a monotonous languor"),[15] meant that it would start within 48 hours and that the resistance should begin sabotage operations especially on the French railroad system; these lines were broadcast on 5 June at 23:15.[16][17][18]
Among the admirers of Verlaine's work was theRussian language poet and novelistBoris Pasternak. Pasternak went so far as to translate much of Verlaine's verse into Russian. According to Pasternak'smistress andmuse,Olga Ivinskaya:
Whenever [Pasternak] was provided with literal versions of things which echoed his own thoughts or feelings, it made all the difference and he worked feverishly, turning them into masterpieces. I remember his translating Paul Verlaine in a burst of enthusiasm like this –L'Art poétique was after all an expression of his own beliefs about poetry.[19]
Although widely regarded as a major French poet, having been electedPrince of Poets towards the end of his life, very few of Verlaine's major works have been translated in their entirety (as opposed to selections therefrom) into English.
^Wilson, Scott.Resting Places: The Burial Sites of More Than 14,000 Famous Persons, 3d ed.: 2 (Kindle Locations 48689-48690). McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers. Kindle Edition.
^Verlane, Paul (1882)."Art Poétique".Aesthetic Realism Online Library. Translated by Eli Siegel (1968). Retrieved18 February 2017.
^Lightbody, Bradley (4 June 2004).The Second World War: Ambitions to Nemesis. Routledge. p. 214.ISBN0-415-22405-5. Retrieved20 July 2013.The French Resistance ... was given 24 hours' warning of the invasion by a BBC radio broadcast. A single line from the poem "Chanson d'automne" by Paul Verlaine, "blessent mon coeur D'une langueur monotone" (wound my heart with a monotonous languor) was the order for action.
