Scrabble- Is it a sport. Review on Scrabble

When I was very young we would spend Sundays at my grandmothers house where she, my mother and two of my aunts would play Scrabble. They drank whisky, smoked cigarettes, disparaged their husbands, gossiped and laughed. It was a club to which, at the age of seven, I could only aspire.

I was so desperate to join though! I would lurk around the kitchen table, hoping not to be noticed, and eavesdrop on all the conversations.

The little, eager child must have caused some comment, for one Christmas I received a game of Junior Scrabble. Kindly meant, no doubt, but I was not happy, I was outraged! I may be only seven I thought, but I’ve already read ‘Little Women’! (First full-length book by the way.) This game had PICTURES for heavens sake! My mother was pretty strict about being grateful for what you received, and so I said nothing but sulked inside for weeks.

For the few of you who don’t already know Scrabble is a game for four players based on making anagrams from a selection of seven letters. Words are placed on a crossword style grid and more points are earned for using uncommon letters like J, K, and X.

The great thing about Scrabble is that it can be played on many levels. I have played the sort of social games my mother and her sisters played where the game was secondary to the chat, highly competitive games at college where we would all seek to shine by using the most esoteric words possible and the Scrabble addiction games where total points were all that mattered (we never got to 1000).

My own children aren’t old enough for Scrabble yet, but you can bet when and if they do show an interest I will take the time to play with them in a child-friendly way. So this review ends as it began – what goes around comes around!