Alphabet Blocks

NARRATOR (WARM, INVITING)
Welcome to Celebrate Creativity and Conversations with Toys,
our after-hours visit to the Metropolitan Museum
of Toys and Childhood Artifacts—
where the lights are low let's get the disclaimer out of the way this podcast behind every line of Shakespeare behind every Erie sentence from Poe behind every every    
the alarms are set,
and words wait quietly on the shelves…
until someone notices them.

NARRATOR (WARM, WRAP-UP):
The alphabet blocks settle back into their tray,
quiet again behind glass—
twenty-six little doors
waiting for the next set of hands
to open them.

Wherever you are listening from tonight,
I hope you’ll remember them the next time
you see a word on a page,
or a sign, or a screen.

Behind every line of Shakespeare,
behind every eerie sentence from Poe,
behind every text, email, and grocery list,
there’s still a tiny alphabet,
stacked up like toy blocks,
holding the whole thing together.

Thank you for spending this after-hours visit
at the Metropolitan Museum
of Toys and Childhood Artifacts.

Transcript

NARRATOR (CALM, FRIENDLY):
Before we begin, a brief disclaimer.

This episode of Celebrate Creativity and Conversations with Toys is a work of creative storytelling. The alphabet blocks and other toys you’ll hear from tonight are fictional characters inspired by the long history of children’s toys and early reading—not by any one specific modern brand or product.

From time to time, you may hear references to real historical ideas—like early American spelling blocks, kindergarten classrooms, or famous writers such as Shakespeare and Edgar Allan Poe. Those details are included to educate and entertain, not to claim any official connection or endorsement by schools, museums, toy makers, or estates.

No company or manufacturer has approved, sponsored, or reviewed this episode.

With that out of the way, we invite you to sit back, imagine the museum lights dimming for the night… and listen in as a simple set of alphabet blocks starts talking about letters, language, and the stories still waiting to be told.

CONVERSATIONS WITH TOYS
“Alphabet Blocks: The First Word Builders”

NARRATOR (WARM, INVITING)
Welcome to Celebrate Creativity and Conversations with Toys,
our after-hours visit to the Metropolitan Museum
of Toys and Childhood Artifacts—
where the lights are low let's get the disclaimer out of the way this podcast behind every line of Shakespeare behind every Erie sentence from Poe behind every every    
the alarms are set,
and words wait quietly on the shelves…
until someone notices them.

NARRATOR (WARM, WRAP-UP):
The alphabet blocks settle back into their tray,
quiet again behind glass—
twenty-six little doors
waiting for the next set of hands
to open them.

Wherever you are listening from tonight,
I hope you’ll remember them the next time
you see a word on a page,
or a sign, or a screen.

Behind every line of Shakespeare,
behind every eerie sentence from Poe,
behind every text, email, and grocery list,
there’s still a tiny alphabet,
stacked up like toy blocks,
holding the whole thing together.

Thank you for spending this after-hours visit
at the Metropolitan Museum
of Toys and Childhood Artifacts.

Tonight, we’re in a quieter corner of the museum.
No flashing lights, no batteries, no screens—
just a wooden case, waist-high,
with a little sign that says:

(beat, fond)
“ALPHABET BLOCKS – c. 19th century.
Early tools for teaching children to read and spell.”

[SOFT FOOTSTEPS. KEYS JINGLE. GLASS RATTLES LIGHTLY.]

NIGHT WATCHMAN (GENTLE, A LITTLE GRAVELLY)
Well now…
It seems I’ve walked past you a hundred times.
Plain little cubes,
chipped paint,
a few teeth marks here and there.

(chuckles)
You don’t light up.
You don’t talk.
You don’t even squeak.

And somehow…
There are those who believe you’re the ones that started it all.

[FAINT CREAK AS HE OPENS THE CASE. A SOFT WOODEN CLATTER AS BLOCKS SHIFT.]

NIGHT WATCHMAN (LOW, TO HIMSELF)
Let’s see here.
Apples, trains, ducks, a few numbers…
and all twenty-six letters,
plus a fancy little squiggle that thinks it’s important.

[WOODEN “TICK-TICK-TICK” AS HE RUNS A FINGER OVER THEM.]

NIGHT WATCHMAN (FOND)
You taught hands that were still sticky with jam
how to spell “CAT” and “DOG” and “MAMA.”
Before Shakespeare’s sonnets showed up in school,
before Poe’s “Nevermore” gave anybody goosebumps…

It was you.
Just you.
Little wooden building blocks with ideas.

[VERY FAINT, MAGICAL CHIME. A BLOCK SLIDES.]

BLOCKS (OVERLAPPING WHISPERS – FAINT AT FIRST)
psst—
stack—
shift—
spell—
over here—
no, no, I go first—

NIGHT WATCHMAN (STARTLED, BUT AMUSED)
…All right now.
Either I need more sleep
or the phonics section is having a meeting.

[A SUDDEN, CLEAR LITTLE “CLACK-CLACK-CLACK” AS A FEW BLOCKS MOVE INTO PLACE.]

[PAUSE. THEN A SOFT WOODEN THUMP, LIKE A TINY PILE FORMING.]

NIGHT WATCHMAN (PEERING)
Oh.
Ohhh, I see you.
Look at that…

[HE READS, SLOWLY, ALMOST LIKE A CHILD SOUNDING IT OUT.]

NIGHT WATCHMAN
P…
O…
E.

(beat)
Poe.
Of course.

BLOCK P (BRISK, PROUD)
Thank you. Yes. That’s me.
Lead letter.
Point of entry.
P is for “Poe,”
“poem,”
and “please stop mispronouncing me as ‘Puh-uh-uh.’”

BLOCK O (DREAMIER, VAGUE)
O is for owls,
and oaths,
and the sound people make when they read a good ending.
“Ohhh…”

BLOCK E (QUICK, CHATTERING)
And I am E—
the hardest working vowel in the English language,
thank you very much.
Try spelling “NEVERMORE” without me.
Go on. I dare you.

You might think I'm fussy, but many people spell AlLan in Edgar Allan Poe
As ALLEN. With anyone knows it is ALLAN

NIGHT WATCHMAN (GRINNING)
So that’s how it is.
A set of Victorian alphabet blocks
that thinks it discovered Edgar Allan Poe.

BLOCK P (SLIGHTLY OFFENDED)
We didn’t discover him.
We just…
preheated the language.

BLOCK E
Exactly.
You don’t get “Poe”
until some small, sticky-fingered child
learns what P and O and E even are.

BLOCK O (SOFTLY)
Before a raven can sit on a bust of Pallas,
a kid somewhere has to connect
this little circle shape
to an open sound in their mouth.


BLOCKS (MURMURING)
Make room—
spell it—
he’s coming—
stack, stack—

NIGHT WATCHMAN (LEANING IN)
Now what are you up to?

[CLACK-CLACK-CLACK-CLACK. A SHORT, NEAT LINE FORMS.]

NIGHT WATCHMAN (READING)
W…
I…
L…
L.

(beat, amused)
“Will,” huh?
As in “Will Shakespeare.”

BLOCK W (SLIGHTLY BOOMING, THEATRICAL)
I am blocked W at your service.
First letter of “William,”
“word,”
and “why is everyone obsessed with Hamlet again?”
And don't forget that all of us letters are important - I hope you learned that when we introduce ourselves.

BLOCK I (PRECISE, A LITTLE NERVOUS)
Don't forget me. I am block I
I am small but essential.
You cannot spell “iambic pentameter” without me.
Twice, actually.
I’ve counted.

BLOCK L (TWO IDENTICAL VOICES, IN UNISON)
We’re L and L. We’re L and L
We move in pairs.
We like lists,
ladders,
and long lines of lovely language.

BLOCK P (GRUMBLY)
I am blocked P.
And this, Night Watchman,
is where our trouble starts.

NIGHT WATCHMAN
Trouble?

BLOCK E (SIGHING)
I am block. E
Typecasting.

BLOCK O
I am Block o
Always the same thing.
Line us up,
make us spell “POE”…

BLOCK W
And I am blocked W
…or “WILL”…

BLOCK L (BOTH)
Don't forget that I am block L
…and then everybody forgets
we can spell anything else.

BLOCK W
I am block W
We could spell “OWL”
and give Poe a friend.

BLOCK P
Don't ever forget that I am block P
Or “PLAY”
and remind Will that words can be fun sometimes.

BLOCK I
You should feel sorry for me because I am blocked I as in
“PILE,”
which is what I am currently stuck in,
by the way.

[SOFT LAUGH FROM THE NIGHT WATCHMAN.]

NIGHT WATCHMAN
So what you’re telling me is—
you’re the understudies.
The ones who do the work backstage.

BLOCK P
We are the foundation.
We were here before Shakespeare’s first folio
ever flipped open in a child’s hands.

BLOCK O
Before anybody whispered “Nevermore”
into the dark,
we were spelling “never”
and “more”
one wooden letter at a time.

BLOCK W
We saw the first scribbles,
the first shaky homework,
the first notes passed in class.

BLOCK L (BOTH, WITH PRIDE)
Note that I am block
Before “literature,”
there was just…
letters.

[A LONGER, GENTLER CLATTER AS MORE BLOCKS STIR, LIKE A ROOM COMING TO LIFE.]

BLOCKS (CHORUS, SOFT, OVERLAPPING)
C for chorus—
S for story—
Q for questions—
H for horror—
B for bard—
R for raven—

NIGHT WATCHMAN (QUIETLY, TAKING IT IN)
So this is where it starts.
Not with a bobblehead of a gloomy author,
or an action figure with a feather pen,
but with a wooden A, B, C
that a little kid tries to stack
higher than their own head.

(beat, warmly)
You know what?
I think the listeners should meet you
before they meet Poe and Shakespeare.

BLOCK E (PLEASED)
And I am one of the most commonly used letters in the alphabet because I am E.
Well finally.
An introduction in the correct order.

BLOCK P (BUSINESSLIKE)
Don't forget me I am blocked P
We can do transitions too, you know.
We’re very good at spelling “NEXT.”

BLOCK O (AMUSED)
Please don't forget me because I am block out
I am necessary to spell
“ACT ONE.”

[SMALL, PLAYFUL WOODEN CLATTER AS THEY SHIFT BACK AND FORTH BETWEEN “POE” AND “WILL.”]

NIGHT WATCHMAN (CHUCKLING)
All right, all right.
First things first.

(to the audience)
How about this—
tonight, we let the alphabet blocks
tell us how letters turned into language,
and how language turned into stories,
and how stories eventually marched themselves
into Shakespeare’s plays
and Poe’s…
creepy, creaky, candlelit little tales.

Because those bobbleheads and action figures
may be the stars of an area of the museum…
but none of them get a single line
without these wooden cubes doing their job first.

NARRATOR (GENTLE, TEASING)
Stay with us.
After the break,
we’ll let the alphabet blocks
build their favorite words—
from A to Z,
from nursery rhymes
to “Nevermore.”

And eventually,
yes… maybe even sooner than you think
we’ll pay a visit
to a certain action figure from Stratford-upon-Avon—
And a bobbleheaded gentleman from Richmond, Virginia
and a certain both of them standing,
whether they like it or not,
on twenty-six little letters.

NIGHT WATCHMAN (SOFT):
“I’ll keep an eye on the toys from here. You keep an eye on your imagination.”

Join celebrate creativity for scene two of “Alphabet Blocks: The First Word Builders”

Thank you for listening to celebrate creativity.

[OPTIONAL: MUSIC SWELLS VERY SOFTLY, THEN FADE TO SECTION BREAK.]
  
Aquarium from Carnival of the Animals by composed by Camille Sans-Saen, Performed by the Seattle Youth Orchestra. Source: https://musopen.org/music/1454-the-carnival-of-the-animals/. License: Public Domain (composition) / Creative Commons (recording).