A free verse is a poetic expression that does not respect the traditional parameters of rhyme and measurement.
Verse is a term with several uses. It may be the set of words that maintain a cadence and are subject to a certain measure. It is important to highlight that the poems have the verses as their first ordered unit. Free , for its part, is that which enjoys freedom (which is not subordinated or tied).
A free verse , therefore, is a kind of expression of poetry that moves away from the usual criteria of measure and rhyme. Although it is possible to affirm that it is a form similar to poetic prose and prose poems , free verse has the particularity of maintaining the traditional typographical location of the verses, that is, indented lines, so that at the level visually it is not possible to relate it to the rest.
Characteristics of free verse
Free verse is characterized by its irregularity and variable length . This mode of expression emerged in the mid- 19th century in opposition to the décima , the sonnet and the rest of the predominant forms in the field of poetry. Although the dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy does not recognize it, it is possible to use the term versolibrismo , a neologism, to refer to the use of this form of expression when creating poetry.
Those who write in free verse do not pay attention to the stanzas , although they can segment their verses into similar units. It is important to highlight that, although rhyme , meter and accentuation are not fixed, the poet continues to take care of musicality.
Variable length and irregularity are the main characteristics of free verse.
Historical tour
Beyond its broad historical development, free verse reached its peak in surrealism , creationism , ultraism , and other avant-garde trends. Its authors opted for the reiteration of syntactic elements and the use of different rhetorical figures, such as metaphor .
It is important to highlight that some of the bases from which free verse tried to distance itself, such as the aforementioned rhyme and meter, had predominated in this form of expression until the last decades of the 19th century. In other words, the mission of tearing down these walls to present to the world a new way of making poetry, and understanding it, was not exactly simple.
A clear predecessor of free verse is the silva , which emerged in the 17th century, which can be defined as a metric series that is constructed from verses of eleven or seven syllables , and with free consonant rhyme , although some verses may not have rhyme. Silva gave baroque poets great freedom when composing, since it allowed them, although implicitly, to avoid structuring in stanzas .
Poets who experimented with free verse
Continuing with its features from a structural point of view, we can say that the form of free verse is less rigid, since it seeks to reflect the naturalness of oral expression, tracing through the outline of its verses the rhythm of inhalation and exhalation of the writer. .
It is common to come across the name Walt Whitman in this context, as he was the first of the world-renowned poets to experiment with free verse. In his particular case, he leaned towards the so-called verse , inspired by the semantic parallelism of the Psalms and Prophets of the Bible.
In addition to Walt Whitman, we can name many great artists of the word who at the time dedicated their efforts to this form of expression, and in this group we find Emily Dickinson , Charles Baudelaire , Anne Sexton , Rubén Darío and Jules Laforgue . On the other hand, it is important to point out that the majority of current poetry relies on free verse, since we are in a time in which the message is valued more than the structure.