UK

In the UK, the accepted dictionary source for tournament and club play is Official Scrabble Words, currently in its 4th edition, first published in 1988. The book is published by Chambers Harrap and is widely available in UK bookshops, it is based on the 1998 Chambers Dictionary and is a list of words acceptable for play in Scrabble, without definition. Seekers after the true meaning of words will need to hold a copy of the Dictionary as well to obtain definitions.

US

In the US, the equivalent book is the Official Scrabble Player's Dictionary (3rd edition) published by Merriam Webster, first published in the late 1970's, this has short definitions for all words shown. In 1993, all offensive words (mainly swear words and racial slurs) were removed. Most Scrabble players the world over are not too concerned with the meaning of words and the North Americans objected violently to losing nearly 200 usable words. Understandably enough, a list of the removed words was never published by Merriam Webster, although, for light relief, it can be found at www.teleport.com/~stevena/scrabble/expurg.html. To placate the tournament and club players, a new book containing all the 'naughty' words was published - the Official Tournament and Club Word List (TWL) - and this book is used in tournament play in North America.

Differences

Those not used to dictionaries might imagine that one dictionary does not differ much from another and that words are either in all dictionaries or none. In fact this is not the case at all. Both dictionaries are unabridged and include many thousands of words such as technical terms, archaisms, words coined by playwrights like Shakespeare or Spenser etc. etc. known only to a very few people. However, it can be argued that TWL has a lesser percentage of archaisms than OSW. There are approximately 142,000 words in OSW, the larger of the two books. Given that the average vocabulary of the man on the Clapham omnibus has been estimated to be 20,000 then no-one will know all of those words. The top players will perhaps know between 75 -100,000.

Of course, many of the words are common to both lists, but there over 21,000 2-9 letter words that only appear in TWL and nearly 40,000 equivalent words that only appear in OSW.

International Clashes: A Solution?

So what happens when players from the UK and US meet in international competition? The first such occasion of significance was the inaugural World Championship in 1991. The organisers of that championship decided sagely to accept words from both lexicons and so a new dictionary was born, colloquially christened some time later as SOWPODS (an anagram of OSW and OSPD), although we use the term 'Combined Dictionary' throughout this site.

This 'dictionary', although it does not exist as a one volume published book, has been embraced by the majority of Scrabble playing nations like Australia, New Zealand, etc. as their word authority in all club and tournament play and is used in all international events. However, the 3 top Scrabble playing nations (in terms of Scrabble club players and ability) - the UK, US and Canada - have, so far, stuck to their own lexicon.

Current Standpoint

This is, by far, the most controversial area within serious Scrabble playing circles. The top players, intent on proving they are the best on an international scale would welcome the use of the combined dictionary at all tournaments. Many others see the advantages of one worldwide dictionary.

Those of a more parochial bent do not see any point in changing the dictionary. They do not intend to play abroad and do not want to have to learn any more words. Some also do not want to have words from another culture within their dictionary, though it's questionable whether OSW or TWL respectively, truly reflect the UK or North American vocabularies. Feelings run very high on the subject.

Even if the Scrabble players were to agree on a worldwide lexicon there are commercial interests to be satisfied as well. The rights to the UK dictionary belong to Chambers, with Mattel (as trademark holders for the world outside of North America) as licenceholder. In North America, Hasbro (North American trademark holders), Merriam Webster and the player's association - National Scrabble Association all have a say in the constituent parts of TWL. Hence the 5 organisations would need to agree that such a dictionary was desirable before it could be produced, so far such agreement has not been reached.

The debate goes on!