An acrostic can be a poem that, with the final, middle or initial letters of its verses, forms a word or a phrase.
Acrostic comes from a Greek word that refers to the end of a verse . The first meaning of the concept mentioned in the dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy ( RAE ) refers to the poem that, with the initial, middle or final letters of its verses, forms an expression or a word .
For example:
I would give everything to see you again,
even that which I never had
or what was mine and I lost it.
That's all I ask: to see you again.
As you can see, if we take the first letter of each verse and put them together, the word “God” is formed. This stanza, therefore, is an acrostic.
By extension, any term or expression that is formed from this method of composition is called an acrostic. “Calm” , in this sense, can be an acrostic derived from “When someone reads, they learn a lot” .
Origins of the concept of acrostic
Regarding the history of this term, it is believed that the first to compose this type of works were the Provençal poets , and that later the Castilians began to incorporate them into their repertoires. Regarding the Provençal poets, they are those writers who used the Occitan language , a Romance language of the European continent, for the creation of their works.
By extension, Provençal or Occitan literature refers to all literary works that use this language. Its origin dates back to the 11th century, and it was found in poetry. The work carried out by the troubadours in disseminating and developing literature promoted the rise of vulgar works in Europe in the Middle Ages .
A popular artifice
At certain moments in the history of literature in which elaborate forms were prominent, as was the case of the literary Baroque , the acrostic was one of the most widespread devices. Leaving aside the discomfort that its lack of directness or overloaded nature may generate in reading, it should be noted that many readers find the process of discovering a relatively hidden message within another entertaining.
There are various examples of acrostics considered famous for belonging to some of the most important works of world literature. Such is the case of the prologue of La Celestina by Fernando de Rojas. It is constructed in verse and with the initials of each of its lines it is possible to construct the phrase "El bachiller". Luis Tovar and Antonio de Lofraso are other authors who made use of the acrostic in their works.
An acrostic is a pastime that consists of discovering words to form others.
The acrostic as a pastime
An acrostic, on the other hand, is a pastime that invites you to discover, by following certain instructions, the words that, placed in a column, allow you to form other words or an expression with their initial letters.
Although it can be said that the acrostic as a game has certain similarities with the crossword puzzle , it is easy to distinguish them in their purest forms, since while the latter is presented as a grid in which various words written horizontally or vertically converge, the acrostic is usually made up of a list of words, all in the same direction, aligned in such a way that one of its letters serves to form the word or phrase that is also called an acrostic. In both cases, the process consists of discovering each word through its definitions.
An example of an acrostic as a pastime is the following:
Discover the name of the color by answering the following questions and joining the initial letters of each answer:
1. What animal is Mickey Mouse? Mouse.
2. What disease does someone who is overweight suffer from? Obesity.
3. What was the first name of Lennon, the musician who was part of The Beatles? John.
4. What is the acronym for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization? NATO.
By joining the initials, the mystery of the acrostic is solved: RED .