RE: William (post#22)
Excellent question.
To be honest, it’s a smidgen of all those answers you offer, bud, but more completely:
Unlike many other poets who adhere to formal theory, I don’t think free verse is simplistic or easy or that it requires less skill or poetic ability. I can state with conviction that free verse requires much more skill than just thrusting words at a sheet of paper with total disregard for metre. I also recognise the purpose or reasons why I at times choose it above formal structure – but I make those choices based on my personal knowledge of formality. I can appreciate well-written free verse because of my understanding of formal theory, but I gained my knowledge of such theory because of my love for poetry on the whole.
Verse forms have declined over the last years with steadily fewer large or well known publications accepting or publishing. I believe this is the result of a misconception; a false belief that structured, metric poetry is stale or forceful, somehow imposing regulation and rigidity on the poet. This is far from true, however much the academics and scholars drum their ‘rules’. When writing formal verse, I bend and break the rules, I play with form and twist theory – I experiment and seek out the liberties in formal verse, because writing to form is no guarantee for quality or poetic prowess. It’s true that free verse can allow the poet to hide a lack of skill behind the absence of structured metric nuance, but equally true that metrical structure can be used to curtain a lack of imagination behind convention.
There are a few home-truths to consider when regarding free verse too. Free verse is not new. In fact, the younger of the two is arguably formal verse. We need to ask why poetry became formalised, what is the point of it – certainly not to restrict the poet or whittle out the less poetic minded, or bar certain individuals from writing. Standardisation should be seen as a guideline for tried and tested methods, no more, no less. No elitist bullshit. Forget the bullshit, embrace the verse, recognise the attention to detail, nothing more.
Beyond this, what is the reality in the difference between them? Free verse intends a method of poetic composition that embraces the freedom of language without the (supposed) restraints (such as metre) of its counterpart, but is identical in its purpose and ideology for the greater part; formal verse defines poetry as something separate from prose in how it establishes rhythm and cadence through its use of metre, but for all other aspects of expression such as imagery and figurative devices, is identical in its ideology to free verse.
Walt Whitman is often celebrated as the originator of English free verse poetry. However, as I stated earlier, free verse under many names has enjoyed a long history pre-dating formal verse. Such poetry can be traced back to Abraham Cowley (circa 1665) and even further, despite the 20th century being its true era of prevalence. That’s not to say that free verse before then was marginal or lacking influence. John Milton has several examples of metre-less poetry, and we can see the influence of non-syllabic accentuation in his turns of phrase. So, classical poets learnt from free verse (under whatever name) and applied the liberties won from it to structured verse – in the case of Elliot and Pound, the same is true of the process in reverse.
It’s also important to note that metre did not, could never have spontaneously appeared over night. It has to have developed over time in order to evolve the theory attached to it. We see this principle in ancient Anglo—Saxon poetry such as alliterated verse. While this poetry relies on accents and parallelisms, it does not confine its lines to a set number of syllables or overly regulated use of such metrics, nor does it demand the use of rhyme. We could argue that such poetic composition is in many ways the primordial formal verse; verse without recurrent metre or overly restrictive structure. Alliterated verse lived for a long time and through many centuries adapted to social, theological and economic climates. Add to this the decades of bastardisation from foreign influences until the ‘new poetry’ (what we consider formal verse) became fashion.
International trading and politics led to poets being exposed to foreign literature, poetry and mythology – it’s only natural that poets of their day (as equals to poets today) experimented with such influences and adapted classical meters to English. In this sense we see poetry as an expressive method of communication becoming a literary art form that has grown from free, more wildly sown roots to sophisticated linguistic maturity, still maintaining that expression; exploring language and remapping it to a melodic frame work, and then reverting to its roots for being lost and marred by haughty-taughty types. Poetry was stolen from the people when terminology and reference came to mean 'correct' (hence my prior mention of bullshit; terminology is good for analysis and learning how composition was done, but not an essential, not un-tweakable, not set in stone), the resurgence of poetry as free verse was its rebirth.
The current climate for a poet should be exploring and experimenting, liberating language and/or redefining it to convention, breaking said conventions and simply expressing oneself in whichever means necessary. Ever heard the saying ‘to forget the past is to destroy the future’? Why not apply that to poetry? The conventions and methodologies, the guidelines etc of formal verse have much to offer and can very easily be incorporated into contemporary poetry. I use metrics when composing free verse, consciously irregular and still fluid, still free. For me it’s always been a case of form meeting function. I can adhere to form; break away from coherent methodologies; fuse formal and free verse (think a free verse sonnet, free verse villanelle, what about an imagist's pantoum or twisted verse?). I can do whatever I want, whatever I need to do… but more importantly, I have that choice.
Whether presented with free verse of formal verse, poetry is what is in front of me, and to deny one is to deny the other. I can’t deny either and a finger in both pies is what serves the poet his filling best.
