Career
In the 18th and early 19th centuries, Collin"s family produced administrative officers in the military, mail and law service as well as physicians. He started a professional career as a lawyer before marrying one of the daughters of Theodore Gobley, a French chemist known for research on the brain, who also discovered lecithin and phospholipids. Poetry proved to be Collin"s real vocation, and he went on to write libretti and song lyrics for a number of opera and cantata, collaborating with contemporary French music composers of the second half of the 19th century including Tchaikovsky, who used several of his shorter poetry works for songs.
Collin published a collection of his work in 1886.
The first award of the Prix Rossini in 1881 was made to Paul Collin and composer Marie, Countess of Grandval for the oratorio Louisiana fille de Jaïre. Collin also wrote as a critic for the journal Le Ménestrel.