At the time of its publication, Dover Beach was written in a highly irregular style that was not very common for the period. Free verse poetry, which would later rise to prominence, was more likely to use similar methods as Dover Beach. This also means that the poem may have served as inspiration for those who also wanted to break some of the rules of poetry, and in this case, the use of more irregular rhyme and meter produces a more uncertain and disjointed effect that works well with the themes that the poem is exploring.