Free verse is an open form of poetry which does not use a prescribed or regular meter or rhyme and tends to follow the rhythm of natural or irregular speech. It encompasses a large range of poetic form, and its distinction to other forms (such as prose) is often ambiguous. In general, the core characteristic of free verse is its flexibility.
History Though individual examples of English free verse poetry surfaced before the 20th century (parts of John Milton's Samson Agonistes or the majority of Walt Whitman's poetry, for example), free verse is generally considered an early 20th century innovation of the late 19th-century French vers libre. However, the sort of cadencing now recognized in free verse can be traced back at least as far as the archaic "Hebrew psalmist" poetry of the Bible. The title of "American father of free verse" has been bestowed upon Walt Whitman.
T. E. Hulme and F. S. Flint first introduced the form to the London-based Poets' Club in 1909.Pondrom, Cryrena The Road from Paris, French Influence on English Poetry 1900-1920 Cambridge University Press 1974 This form later became the heart of the Imagist movementF. S. Flint, The History of Imagism Essay in The Egoist May 1915 through Flint's advocacy of the genre.Jones Peter (editor) Introduction to Imagist Poetry Penguin Books Imagism, in the wake of French Symbolism (i.e. vers libre of French Symbolist poetsPratt William Introduction to The Imagist Poem, modern poetry in miniature Uno Press 1963 edition ), was the wellspring out of which the main current of Modernism in English flowed.Pratt William Preface to The Imagist Poem, modern poetry in miniature Uno Press 1963 edition T. S. Eliot later identified this as "the point de repere usually taken as the starting point of modern poetry,"Eliot T. S. Address To Criticize the Critic to Washington University June 1953, Faber & Faber 1965 since hundreds of poets were led to adopt vers libre as their medium.Untermeyer, Louis, Preface to Modern American Poetry Harcourt Brace& Co New York 1950
In the 21st century, most published poems are considered to be free verse. Free verse is one of the more popular forms of poetry today and is considered the "norm."
Definition Verse is free "when it is not primarily obtained by the metered line." Free verse does not have "predetermined patterns that define many other poetic forms," but it is not considered to be completely free. In 1948, Charles Allen wrote, "The only freedom cadenced verse obtains is a limited freedom from the tight demands of the metered line." Free verse is as equally subject to elements of form (the poetic line, rhythm, strophes or strophic rhythms, stanzaic patterns, and rhythmic units or cadences) as other forms of poetry. Donald Hall goes as far as to say that "the form of free verse is as binding and as liberating as the form of a rondeau,"Donald Hall, in the essay 'Goatfoot, Milktongue, Twinbird' in the book of 0-472-40000-2. and T. S. Eliot wrote, "No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job."Eliot quote from the essay, "The Music of Poetry" Jackson (1 January 1942) ASIN B0032Q49RO
Kenneth Allott, the poet and critic, said the adoption by some poets of vers libre arose from "mere desire for novelty, the imitation of Whitman, the study of Jacobean dramatic blank verse, and the awareness of what French poets had already done to the alexandrine in France."Introductory Note by Kenneth Allott (ed.) The Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse, Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, England 1950 The American critic John Livingston Lowes in 1916 observed "Free verse may be written as very beautiful prose; prose may be written as very beautiful free verse. Which is which?"Lowes, Livingston John, Nation Feb 1916
Some poets have considered free verse restrictive in its own way. In 1922, Robert Bridges voiced his reservations in the essay "Humdrum and Harum-Scarum". Robert Frost, in a comment regarding Carl Sandburg, later remarked that "Writing free verse is like playing tennis with the net down." Sandburg responded saying, in part, "There have been poets who could and did play more than one game of tennis with unseen rackets, volleying airy and fantastic balls over an insubstantial net, on a frail moonlight fabric of a court." The Robert Frost Encyclopedia. Nancy Lewis Tuten, John Zubizarreta. Greenwood Press (2001). Page 318. Lingeman, Richard. "A Poet for the People: Carl Sandburg: A Biography". Los Angeles Times. 14 July 1991. William Carlos Williams said, "Being an art form, a verse cannot be free in the sense of having no limitations or guiding principles."Free Verse, Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, 2nd Ed, 1975 Yvor Winters, the poet and critic, said, "…the greatest fluidity of statement is possible where the greatest clarity of form prevails. … The free verse that is really verse—the best that is, of W.C. Williams, H. D., Marianne Moore, Wallace Stevens, and Ezra Pound—is, in its peculiar fashion, the antithesis of free." Winters, Yvor. Primitivism and Decadence: A Study of American Experimental Poetry. Arrow Editions, New York, 1937. p. 7
In Welsh poetry, however, the term has a completely different meaning. According to Jan Morris, "When Welsh poets speak of Free Verse, they mean forms like the sonnet or the ode, which obey the same rules as English poesy. Strict Metres verse still honors the immensely complex rules laid down for correct poetic composition 600 years ago."Jan Morris (1984), The Matter of Wales: Epic Views of a Small Country, Oxford University Press. Page 152.
In general, there seems to be disagreement on whether free verse is restricted by foundational poetry conventions or not.
Vers libre Vers libre is a free-verse poetic form of flexibility, complexity, and naturalnessHover, Richard Poet in Town Interview with Boston Record Sept 1898 created in France in 1886. It was largely through the activities of La Vogue, a weekly journal founded by Gustave Kahn,Scott, Clive, Vers libre: the emergence of free verse in France, 1886-1914 Clarendon Press, Oxford as well as the appearance of a band of poets unequaled at any one time in the history of French poetry.Hulme, T. E. Lecture on Modern Poetry, Kensington Town Hall 1914 Their style of poetry was dubbed "Counter-Romanticism" and it was led by Verlaine, Rimbaud, Mallarmé, Laforgue, and Corbière.Pratt, William, Introduction to The Influence of French Symbolism on Modern American Poetry by René Taupin, AMS Press Inc, New York 1985 It is concerned with synesthesia (the harmony or equilibrium of sensation)I A Richards & C.K.Ogden The Foundations of Aesthetics, Lear Publisher, New York 1925 and later described as "the moment when French poetry began to take consciousness of itself as poetry."Maritain Jaques, The Situation of Poetry Now, Philosophical Library, New York, 1955 Gustave Kahn was commonly supposed to have invented the term vers libre and according to F. S. Flint, he "was undoubtedly the first theorist of the technique(s)."Flint, F. S., Contemporary French Poetry, The Poetry Review Aug 1912 Later in 1912, Robert de Souza published his conclusion on the genre, voicing thatde Souza, Robert, Du Rythme en Francais, Welter, Paris 1912 "A vers libre was possible which would keep all the essential characteristics of vers Classique, but would free it from the encumbrances which usage had made appear indispensable."Taupin, René, The Influence of French Symbolism on Modern American Poetry (1986),(trans William Pratt) AMS Studies in Modern Literature, Thus, the practice of vers libre is not the abandoning of pattern, but the creation of an original and complicated metrical form for each poem.Pondrom, Cryrena The Road from Paris, French Influence on English Poetry 1900-1920 Cambridge University Press 1974
The formal stimuli for vers libre were vers libéré (French verse of the late 19th century that liberated itself from classical rules of versification whilst observing the principle of isosyllabism and regular patterned rhyme) and vers libre Classique (a minor French genre of the 17th and 18th century which conformed to classic concepts, but in which lines of different length were irregularly and unpredictably combined) and vers Populaire (versification derived from oral aspects of popular song). Remy de Gourmont's Livre des Masques gave definition to the whole vers libre movement;Read, Herbert The Tenth Muse New York 1958 he noted that there should arise, at regular intervals, a full and complete line, which reassures the ear and guides the rhythm.Remy de Gourmand, Le Probleme du Style, Paris 1900
Form and structure The unit of vers libre is not the foot, the number of the syllables, the quantity, or the line. The unit is the strophe, which may be the whole poem or only a part. Each strophe is a complete circle.Lowes, John Livingston Conventions and Revolt in Poetry Houghton Mifflin, Boston 1919 Vers libre is "verse-formal based upon cadence that allows the lines to flow as they will when read aloud by an intelligent reader."Lowell, Amy, Preface, Sword Blades, and Poppy Seed; North American Review for January 1917
Unrhymed cadence in vers libre is built upon "organic rhythm" or the rhythm of the speaking voice with its necessity for breathing, rather than upon a strict metrical system.Lowes, John Livingston Conventions and Revolt in Poetry Houghton Mifflin, Boston 1919 Vers libre addresses the ear, not the eye.de Souza Robert, Du Rythme en Francais, Welter, Paris 1912 Vers libre is liberated from traditional rules concerning meter, caesura, and line end stopping.Kahn, Gustave, Le Vers libre, Paris, 1923 ASIN: B008XZTTY2 Every syllable pronounced is of nearly equal value but is less strongly accented than in English; being less intense requires less discipline to mold the accents into the poem's rhythm. This new technique, as defined by Kahn, consists of the denial of a regular number of syllables as the basis for versification; the length of the line is long and short, oscillating with images used by the poet following the contours of his or her thoughts and is free rather than regular.Hulme, T. E., Lecture on Modern Poetry, Kensington Town Hall 1914
Although free verse requires no meter, rhyme, or other traditional poetic techniques, a poet can still use them to create some sense of structure. A clear example of this can be found in Walt Whitman's poems, where he repeats certain phrases and uses commas to create both a rhythm and structure.
Pattern and discipline are to be found in good free verse; the internal pattern of sounds, the choice of exact words, and the effect of associations give free verse its beauty.Boulton, Marjories, Anatomy of Poetry, Routledge&Kegan, London 1953 With the Imagists, free verse became a discipline and acquired status as a legitimate poetic form.Pratt, William. The Imagist Poem, Modern Poetry in Miniature (Story Line Press, 1963, expanded 2001). . Herbert Read, however, noted that "the Imagist Ezra Pound gave free verse its musical structure to an extent that paradoxically it was no longer free."Read, Herbert Ezra Pound, The Tenth Muse. Routledge & Kegan Paul, London 1957
Unrestrained by traditional boundaries, the poet possesses more license to express and has more control over the development of the poem; This can allow for a more spontaneous and individualized poetic art product.
Technically, free verse has been described as spaced prose, a mosaic of verse and prose experience.Patterson, William Morrison, Rhythm of Prose (Preface 2nd edition) Columbia University Press, 1916.
Antecedents