Category: Scrabble

This final Scrabble post of the semester features the names of authors and characters that are playable words. Learning these will not only increase your word power and up your game, it will also broaden your knowledge of literature. If you haven’t read some of classics listed here, I encourage you to check them out.

• eyre: a long journey (the last name of of the title character in Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, 1847)
• dickens: a devil (Charles Dickens, 1812-1870)
• fagin: a person, usually an adult, who instructs others, usually children, in crime (from a character of that type in Dickens’ Oliver Twist, 1838)
• holden: the past participle of hold (Holden Caulfield, the protagonist in J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, 1951)
• huckleberry: a berry like a blueberry (the first name of the title character in Mark Twain’s Adventures of Hucklebery Finn, 1884)
• oedipal: describing libidinal feelings of a child toward the parent of the opposite sex (from the title character in Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex, c. 429 B.C.)
• quixote: a quixotic, or extremely idealistic person; also quixotry, a quixotic action or thought (the title character in Michael de Cervantes’ Don Quixote, Part I: 1605, Part II: 1615)

Note that “huckleberry” and “quixote” could not be the first two words played in a Scrabble game because “huckleberry” is more than seven letters long. However, “huckleberry” and “quixote” could constitute the first three plays. The first two plays could be “berry” and “quixote,” and the third play could add “huckle” to “berry.”

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Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips, including this one.

In honor of the Bard of Avon, born on April 16, 1564, this week’s Scrabble post features Shakespeare characters whose names are also playable common nouns.

• ariel: a gazelle found in Africa (Ariel, The Tempest, 1611-12)
• dogberry: the fruit of a dogwood tree (Dogberry, Much Ado about Nothing, 1598-1599)
• hamlet: a village (the title character of Hamlet, 1600-1601)
• lear: learning (the title character of King Lear, 1605-1606)
• puck: a disk used in ice hockey and other games (Puck, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, 1595-1596)
• romeo: a seductive lover, a male lover (one of the title characters in Romeo and Juliet, 1594-1595)
• shylock: to lend money with a high interest rate (Shylock, The Merchant of Venice, 1596-1597)

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Next Up

When class resumes next Wednesday, you will have your final Wordplay Day of the semester! To prepare, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips, including this one.

As I noted in last week’s Scrabble post, keeping a u on your rack before the q is played is one way to decrease the chances that you will be left holding the q, a deduction of ten points. From the “Two-Letter Words, Q-Z” blog post, you know that qi (the central life force in Chinese culture) is one u-less option–and one that’s fairly easy to play since there are nine i’s in the game. Learning additional q words without u’s, such as the ones listed below, will increase your word power and provide you with more options for playing the q.

• qibla(s): the direction of the Kaaba shrine in Mecca toward which all Muslims turn in ritual prayer. Also qiblah, kibla, and kiblah
• qigong(s): a Chinese system of physical exercises.
• qindar, pl. dars or darka: a monetary unit of Albania. Also qintar(s).
• qiviut: the wool of a musk ox.
• qoph(s): the nineteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Also koph.

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Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips, including this one.

Keeping a u on your rack before the q is played is one way to decrease the chances that you will be left holding the q, a deduction of ten points. Learning q words without u’s, such as the ones listed below, will increase your word power and provide you with more options for playing the q.

• qabala(s): an esoteric method, discipline, and school of thought in Jewish mysticism. Also qabalah, cabala, and kabbalah.
• qadi(s): an Islamic judge. Also cadi.
• qaid(s): a Muslim tribal chief. Also caid.
• qajak(s): a kayak.
• qamutik(s): a sled drawn by dogs. Also komatik.
• qanat(s): a system of underground tunnels and wells in the Middle East
• qapik(s): a monetary subunit of the manat (Azerbaijan).
• qat(s): a shrub
• qawwali(s): a style of Muslim music

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Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, and review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips, including this one.

Since we studied Stephen King’s “Strawberry Spring” earlier this week, today’s Scrabble blog post is a King-inspired one devoted to words for ghosts, including banshee, which appears in the story.

• banshee: a female spirit in Gaelic folklore that wails to warn of a family member’s imminent death. Note that this word is featured in Stephen King’s short story “Strawberry Spring,” which we examined in class yesterday.
• barguest: a goblin (also barghest)
• bogy: a goblin
• daimon: a spirit (also daemon and demon)
• eidolon: a phantom or specter
• fairyism: the quality of being like a fairy (not really a ghost but a great word)
• haint: a ghost
• kelpie: a water sprite in Scottish folklore known for drowning sailors
• wraith: a ghost of a person, often appearing just before that person’s death
• zombi: a zombie 

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Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website. Also review the blog posts devoted to Scrabble tips, including this one.

The last Scrabble post featured a list of toponyms (place names) in the first half of the alphabet. This post includes a list of toponyms in the second half. These proper nouns are playable in Scrabble because they’re also common nouns. Studying them offers you additional opportunities to broaden your vocabulary and up your game.

• oxford: a type of shoe, also known as a bal or balmoral
• panama: a type of wide-brimmed hat
• paris: a type of plant found in Europe and Asia that produces a lone, poisonous berry
• roman: a romance written in meter
• scot: an assessed tax
• scotch: to put an end to; or to etch or scratch (as in hopscotch)
• sherpa: a soft fabric used for linings
• siamese: a water pipe providing a connection for two hoses
• swiss: a sheer, cotton fabric
• texas: a tall structure on a steamboat containing the pilothouse
• toledo: a type of sword known for its fine craftsmanship, originally from Toledo
• wale: to injure, to create welts on the skin
• warsaw: a type of grouper fish
• waterloo: a definitive defeat
• zaire: a currency of Zaire

Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, and review the posts on my blog devoted to Scrabble tips, including this one.

Note: Due to unforeseen circumstances, the group Check, Please! presentation scheduled for this morning has been postponed until Friday. Subsequently, Friday’s Wordplay Day will take place instead.

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The first Scrabble post of the semester featured first names that are also common nouns, making them playable in Scrabble. Today’s post includes place names, or toponyms, more proper nouns that are playable in Scrabble because they’re also common nouns. Studying these words offers you additional opportunities to broaden your vocabulary and up your game.

• afghan: a wool blanket
• alamo: a cottonwood poplar tree
• alaska: a heavy fabric
• berlin: a type of heavy fabric
• bermudas: a variety of knee-length, wide-legged shorts
• bohemia: a community of unconventional, usually artistic, people
• bolivia: a soft fabric
• bordeaux: a wine from the Bordeaux region
• boston: a card game similar to whist
• brazil: a type of tree found in Brazil used to make instrument bows (also brasil)
• brit: a non-adult herring
• cayman: a type of crocodile, also known as a spectacled crocodile (also caiman)
• celt: a type of axe used during the New Stone Age
• chile: a spicy pepper (also chili)
• colorado: used to describe cigars of medium strength and color
• congo: an eellike amphibian
• cyprus: a thin fabric
• dutch: referring to each person paying for him or herself
• egyptian: a sans serif typeface
• english: to cause a ball to spin
• french: to slice food thinly
• gambia: a flowering plant known as cat’s claw (also gambier, which is a small town in Ohio)
• geneva: gin, or a liquor like gin
• genoa: a type of jib (a triangular sail), also known as a jenny, first used by a Swedish sailor in Genoa
• german: also known as the german cotillon, an elaborate nineteenth-century dance
• greek: something not understood
• guinea: a type of British coin minted from 1663 to 1813
• holland: a linen fabric
• japan: to gloss with black lacquer
• java: coffee
• jordan: a chamber pot
• kashmir: cashmere
• mecca: a destination for many people

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Next Up (Later This Morning)

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website, and review the posts on my blog devoted to Scrabble tips, including this one.

Coming Soon

In class on Friday, you will finalize your preparations, deliver your Check, Please! presentation, and write your reflection.

To mark the eve of the first day of our windiest month, this Scrabble post features playable wind-related words. If your rack contains the right letters, spelling these words will be a breeze.

• bayamo: a strong wind found in Cuba
• bhut: a warm, dry wind in India (also bhoot)
• bise: a cold, dry wind, found especially blowing from the northeast in Switzerland (also bize)
• blaw: to blow
• bleb: a blister (an extremely intense or severe wind)
• bora: a cold wind in lowland regions
• brr: used to indicate feeling cold (also brrr)
• bura: a violent Eurasian windstorm (also buran)
• chinook: a warm wind that flows off the east side of the Rockies; or a type of Pacific Northwest salmon named after the Chinook people)
• fon: a warm dry wind that blows down off some mountains (also fohn and foehn)

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Next Up

On Monday, we will examine the sample Keller and King analyses that you read and annotated for class, and I will distribute copies of a model analysis of my own for us to study.

Knowing words with multiple vowels proves useful when you’re faced with a rack of mostly, or all, vowels. Here’s a list of the first twenty-two playable four-letter words with three vowels:

• aeon: a long period of time (also eon)
• agee: to one side (also ajee)
• agio: a surcharge applied when exchanging currency
• ague: a sickness associated with malaria
• ajee: to one side (also agee)
• akee: a tropical tree
• alae: wings (pl. of ala)
• alee: on the side shielded from wind
• amia: a freshwater fish
• amoa: a kind of small buffalo
• awee: a little while
• eaux: waters (pl. of eau)
• eide: distinctive appearances of things (pl. of eidos)
• emeu: an emu
• etui: an ornamental case
• euro: an Australian marsupial, also known as wallaroo, for being like the kangaroo and the wallaby; also a unified currency of much of Europe
• ilea: the terminal portions of small intestines (pl. of ileum)
• ilia: pelvic bones (pl. of ilium)
• jiao: a Chinese currency (also chiao)
• luau: a large Hawaiian feast
• meou: to meow
• moue: a pouting expression

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Next Up

Wordplay Day! To prepare for class, revisit the Dictionary and World Builder pages on the Scrabble website. Also review the Scrabble blog posts, including this one.