Verse vs. Prose: How to Read the Verse--UPDATED

The real hang-up with Shakespeare's language is the poetry.  It is a huge hurdle for the reader and sometimes the actor to overcome.  Not all of the Shakespeare plays are written in verse, though.  Much of his plays are written in prose form, and look like a traditional paragraph or a typical play.  Knowing the differences between the two and how to use each to great advantage are paramount to approaching any Shakespeare text.

Merry Wives of Windsor is atypical of most of Shakespeare's plays as it is mostly written in prose form.  I think Much Ado About Nothing may be the only play to have even less verse.  Historically, verse was the common form of playwriting in the Elizabethan era.  Shakespeare was a radical to use as much prose as he did.

He didn't make the choice to use either prose or verse willy nilly.  It was all a very proscribed and determined. 

There are no hard and fast rules when it comes to why he used each form.  In general, you could say that the upper classes spoke in verse form while the lower classes spoke in prose, and generally you'd be right.  The comedy sections of the tragedies are written almost entirely in prose form, but a lot of the comedies are written in verse form, and every one of the comedies use verse to great effect--including the prose comedy, Merry Wives of Windsor.

When discussing verse, and especially verse in Merry Wives, it is important to know why the conscious choice was made to use it.  When talking about verse, I prefer to think of it as if it were a song in a musical.  Obviously, there is a rhythm and a music to the sequences, but more importantly verse is used because the moment is important.  One of my favorite terms to use when discussing verse is heightened language.  Quite simply the dramatic moment of the play is so intense, so heightened, that only verse can serve the moment.  This is like in a musical when the emotions of the dramatic moment become so heightened, so intense, all a character can do about it is sing.  So the most influential determinant in the verse/prose game is what does the character want and why do they need to "sing" about it.

After it is determined why the verse, then you can look at how to use the verse.  There are many tricks and tips that you can use to determine the "right way" to say a verse passage.  Shakespeare may not have written many stage directions, but if you can interpret the workings of the verse, then you have the key to unlocking how to say the verse.

When we say verse, what we are really saying is blank verse.  It is said that blank verse is the poetic form that most closely resembles everyday speech.  Blank verse is a series of unrhymed lines of iambic pentameter.  This means that it looks like poetry, but the ends of the lines don't rhyme.   You can visually spot verse on the page; it looks a lot different from the prose.  But this is a gross simplification.

The more complicated explanation of this is that blank verse is a series of unrhymed lines where each line has ten syllables.  The syllables will follow the rhythm of unstressed stressed unstressed stressed unstressed stressed unstressed stressed unstressed stressed--literally 5 feet (pentameter) of the iamb rhythm (unstressed stressed).  For example this speech of Fenton's from Act III, Scene 4 (lines 4-7):

He doth object I am too great of birth,
And that my state being galled with my expense
I seek to heal it only by his wealth.

Here are three lines of 10 beats each ("being" must be pronounced as "bean") and all follow the iambic rhythm of unstressed stressed. 

Where Shakespeare's genius shines through is when he messes with the iambic pentameter.  He may vary the number of syllables (beats) or introduce a different rhythmic figure.  When he does this, it is for a specific reason.  Spotting the difference and processing it is called scanning the line or doing scansion.  Interpreting the scansion can tell you how to say the line.

If there are fewer than 10 beats per line, then it means one of two things:  (1) there is a pause implicit somewhere in the line or (2) two characters are sharing the ten beats and they need to be sure to pick up their cues.  An example of the first instance would be in Act III, Scene 4 (line 11).  Fenton has just gone on and on to Anne about why her father thinks that Fenton is after Anne's money then Anne responds with just a 6 beat line of her own:

May be he tells you true.

After her 6 beats, Fenton responds with another full line of verse.  By only being 6 beats her response implies there is a pause somewhere.  The actress now gets to choose where to put the pause.  Does she put it before she speaks--perhaps assessing him before pronouncing her verdict?  Does she put it in the middle of the line--perhaps after "May be" teasing him a bit?  Or before "true" indicating a more cool calculation.  Does she leave it for the end of the line, giving the power of the pause to Fenton?  Then he has to fill the moment possibly using the beats to decide what is the right thing to say next.

In Act IV, scene 4 (lines 56-65), the two Fords and the Pages are coming up with the final plan to embarrass Falstaff.  As their plans get more detailed, they begin sharing more and more lines of blank verse.  Almost finishing each other's thoughts or getting carried away by the excitement of it all, increasing the scene's pace:

       MRS. PAGE
Then let them all encircle him about
And, fairylike, to pinch the unclean knight,
And ask him why, that hour of fairy revel,
In their so sacred paths he dares to tread
In shape profane.
       MRS. FORD.
                           And till he tell the truth,
Let the supposed fairies pinch him sound
And burn him with their tapers.
       FORD
                                               The children must
Be practiced well to this, or they'll ne'er do't.

Those lines have a natural speedy rhythm to them now.

If a single line has more than 10 beats in it (usually just 11, but occasionally 12), then Shakespeare is usually telling the actor to pick up the tempo of this line.  In the above quote Mrs. Ford and Ford share line 64:

And burn him with their tapers.  The children must

It's 11 beats.  It makes sense for the scene that these lines overlap a bit as Ford is a bit of a buzzkill and is quick throughout the play to dismiss his wife's notions.  By either picking up the cues or increasing the internal rate of the characters' lines, the pace of the scene also increases adding to the sense of madcap hijinks.

A better more-than-10-beat example would be Fenton's response to Anne's 6 beat line in Act III, scene 4.  Again, Fenton has just gone on and on about why her father thinks that Fenton is after Anne's money then Anne responds, "May be he tells you true."  Regardless of where the pause falls, Fenton's response is 11 beats:

No, Heaven so speed me in my time to come!

Fenton is desperate to assuage her fears, regardless of whether he is actually after her money or not and regardless of her either testing or teasing him.  By putting 11 beats in the 10 beat line, Shakespeare is telling the actor to say the line a bit quicker.

Less often, 11 beats in a single line is merely a signifier to the actor (and the audience) that this line is something special.  It means more, and it does not necessaily need to be rushed.  In Act 3, Scene 4, (lines 69-70), Page finds Fenton hanging around his house:

You wrong me, sir, thus still to haunt my house.
I told you, sir, my daughter is disposed of.

The first line has 10 beats; the second has 11.  And while no one would deny the anger that Page must be feeling at finding Fenton at his house, you would be hard pressed to find anyone who would want that second line to be rushed in delivery.  By puttting 11 beats in the line, Shakespeare draws attention to the line, and tells the actor to pay careful attention to it--it's important.

The other thing Shakespeare will do is mess up the regular iambic pattern of unstressed stressed.  Do not think that when the rhythm strays from the iambic that Shakespeare is just being lazy or was unable to find the right word.  These rhythmic choices are just as intentional as too few or too many beats per line.  For example, in Act IV, scene 6 (lines 8-9), Fenton says to the Host:

From time to time I have acquainted you
With the dear love I bear to fair Anne Page

First a perfect line of iambic pentameter, followed by a line of unstressed unstressed stressed stressed stressed stressed unstressed stressed stressed stressed.  All of those stressed syllables (first dear, love, I and bear and then later fair, Anne and Page) put together must be tended to and therefore underline the importance of those words to Fenton.  The verse tells us how strongly he feels because it goes against the grain of iambic pentameter.

Shakespeare might throw in some rhymed lines on occasion.  This, too, is purposeful.  It will make the verse sound more archaic, more heightened, more poetic.  It is usually used either to make fun of the person speaking this way, or to show that the person is overwhelmed by the emotion of the moment.  In many of his plays that are written with more verse, Shakespeare has been known to slip a full sonnet (a 14 line poem with a specific rhyme pattern) into a speech; heightening the emotion of the moment to its poetic fullest.  There are no hidden sonnets in Merry Wives that I have found, but it wouldn't surprise me if Fenton didn't have one.  However, several of the characters do use rhymed lines, especially Pistol.  Pistol will break into a fiery speech of rhymed verse whenever his dander is raised, and it is used to show how over the top his reaction is.

This is how it works for every bit of verse in any Shakespeare play, even if the play is written mostly in verse form.  Fortunately for Merry Wives very few characters speak in verse.  Fenton carries most of the poetic banner, and that fits his character nicely as he is one so hopelessly in love.  But many of the others characters dabble in verse at least a little bit.  Pistol whenever he gets taken emotionally by the moment.  Quickly and Evans as they are a part of the fairy court at the end of the play.  The spouses as they plan to take down Falstaff together.  Etc. Etc. Etc.