The article is devoted to one of the most outstanding poets of France in the second half of the 19th century. Paul Verlaine, who began his career in the vein of romanticism and completed it with the discovery of a new literary and aesthetic direction. The authors trace the main stages of this evolution, related to the creation of Verlaine's central poetry collections (from "Saturnic verses" to "Songs without Words"). Specific features of impressionism as a new style in literature are characterized.