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Word Freak by Stefan Fatsis Rating: ••• (Recommended)
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Tales of Tiles Wall Street Journal sports reporter Stefan Fatsis introduces readers to the unusual world of competitive Scrabble players in his book, Word Freak: Heartbreak, Triumph, Genius, and Obsession in the World of Competitive Scrabble Players. Fatsis assumes a Studs Terkel-like approach in presenting a dozen or so people and their stories about a world not often seen by most of us. He goes beyond Studs in telling his own story of a two-year journey from novice player to expert. The description of the game and the competitive players, along with Fatsis’ own story-within-a-story, becomes as addictive as the game itself as you turn the pages to see what happens next. If you think you know something about Scrabble, this book will teach you otherwise: “To play competitive Scrabble, one has to get over the conceit of refusing to acknowledge certain words as real and accept that the game requires learning words that may not have any outside utility. In the living room, Scrabble is about who has a better working vocabulary. It’s a sort of crossword puzzle in reverse. But in the tournament room, Scrabble has nothing to do with vocabulary. If it did, I – an Ivy League-educated professional journalist, for crying out loud – would rule. But I can only dream of competing with the champions. No, Scrabble isn’t about words. It’s about mastering the rules of the game, and the words are the rules.” Readers learn some of the words, and the approach players take to memorizing word lists and doing anagrams as ways of preparing to compete with the best players in the world. Fatsis reveals his personal obsession, and tournament preparation and play, in ways that go beyond what the usual journalist would reveal. The author’s participation and observation are both intense and acute, and readers benefit from his introspection and insight. Here’s another excerpt from a description of a tournament in Bird in Hand, Pennsylvania: “I’m standing in the hotel parking lot. A group of Amish boys, no older than ten, walk by in straw hats, black pants, and white shirts, and I imagine how I would explain to them what I’m experiencing right now: how I’m about to play a big Scrabble game, how I’m eating a Snickers bar for energy, how I’m standing here alone, breathing deeply the malodorous air, because I need to focus on the game, to minimize distractions, to get away from the white-noise chitchat that fills the playing rooms between rounds. Could I make them understand why this tournament is important to me? Why the act of playing a single round of a mass-produced board game against a middle-aged woman will affect my mood and self-esteem for days to come? Could I explain the player I walked past in the hotel parking lot this morning, mumbling to himself, who didn’t look up, who looked mentally lost? Could I explain how I can relate to that sort of behavior, how this game has made the socially bizarre commonplace?” The people Fatsis introduces are ones you might not meet in the normal course of your life. Reading Work Freak made me not want to continue my 30-year hiatus from Scrabble playing. Steve Hopkins, June 12, 2002
ã 2002 Hopkins and Company, LLC The recommendation rating for this book appeared in the August 2002 issue of Executive Times Hopkins & Company, LLC • 723 North Kenilworth Avenue • Oak Park, IL 60302 Phone: 708-466-4650 • Fax: 708-386-8687 E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com www.hopkinsandcompany.com