Difference between Blank verse and Free Verse

The term verse has many meanings in poetry; a verse can refer to a single metrical line, a stanza of a poem or the poem itself is called a verse.

There are three types of Verse —

1. Rhymed Verse

The rhymed verse is the most common and it usually has a metrical form that rhymes throughout the poem. It has both the rhythmic lines and rhyming scheme, or we can say a poem in which lines have rhythm and they do rhyme too is a rhymed verse. For Example- Shakespeare’s play Macbeth’s lines-

Double, double, toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

2. Blank verse

Blank Verse s a kind of poetry which is written in a regular meter but does not contain any rhyme. The blank verse is most commonly found in the form of iambic pentameter.

Each Iambic pentameter line has 10 syllables five unstressed and five stressed” an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable.

William Shakespeare’s HAMLET: To be, or not to be that is the question is the example of blank verse.

3. Free verse-

Free verse is an open form of poetry, It does not use any rhyme or meter patterns. The lines of the poem do not have rhythm and they do not rhyme. It generally mimics natural speech there is no musical quality.

For example- William Carlos Williams’s “This Is Just To Say”

I have eaten
the plums
that were
in the icebox

For more detail please Watch My YouTube video on Blank Verse and Free verse