Unrhymed Iambic Pentameter (a.k.a. Blank Verse)
The Alchemist is mostly written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. Hey, Will Shakespeare wasn't the only playwright getting his blank verse on in the 16th and 17th Centuries.
What does that mean, exactly? Well, when characters in this play talk they sound like this:
ba-DUM, ba-DUM, ba-DUM, ba-DUM, ba-DUM.
An "iamb" is an unaccented syllable followed by an accented one. "Penta" means "five," and "meter" refers to a regular rhythmic pattern. So "iambic pentameter" is a kind of rhythmic pattern that consist of five iambs per line. It's the most common rhythm in English poetry.
Let's try it out on this line spoken by Tribulation Wholesome: "The children of perdition are oft times" (3.1.15).
the-CHIL dren-OF per-DI tion-ARE oft-TIMES
Since the lines don't rhyme, we called it (boringly enough) unrhymed iambic pentameter.
The thing to remember is that iambic pentameter is pretty versatile. So, even though the characters pretty much all use the same meter in this play, Jonson's able to make them all sound like individuals with their own speech style. That's a pretty big deal because his characters are from all different walks of life and have their own ways of expressing themselves. Go to "Tools of Characterization" and read what we have to say about "Speech and Dialogue."