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What is chess?

  • Chess is a fairy tale of 1001 blunders - Savielly Tartakower

  • Chess is a beautiful mistress. - Larsen

  • Chess is life - Bobby Fischer

  • Chess is like life - Boris Spassky

  • Chess is everything - art, science, and sport. - Karpov

  • Chess is 99 percent tactics. - Teichmann

  • Chess is really 99 percent calculation - Soltis

  • Chess is mental torture. - Kasparov

  • Chess is ruthless: you've got to be prepared to kill people. - Nigel Short

  • Chess is a sea in which a gnat may drink and an elephant may bathe - Indian proverb

  • Chess is as much a mystery as women - Purdy

  • Chess, like love, like music, has the power to make men happy. - Tarrasch

    • General Tips

    • When you see a good move wait - look for a better one. -  Emanuel Lasker
    • Play the opening like a book, the middle game like a magician, and the endgame like a machine. - Spielmann
    • All that matters on the chessboard is good moves. - Bobby Fischer
    • The pawns are the soul of chess. - Philidor

    Tactics

    • The blunders are all there on the board, waiting to be made. - Tartakover

    • No price is too great for the scalp of the enemy King. - Koblentz

    • The winner of the game is the player who makes the next-to-last mistake. - Tartakover

    • A man surprised is half beaten. - Proverb

    • Chess is 99 percent tactics. - Teichmann

    • There are two types of sacrifices: correct ones and mine. - Tal

    • The defensive power of a pinned piece is only imaginary. - Nimzovich

    • The pin is mightier than the sword. - Reinfeld

    • The combination player thinks forward; he starts from the given position, and tries the forceful moves in his mind. - Emanuel Lasker

    • Discovered check is the dive-bomber of the chessboard. - Fine

    • If the student forces himself to examine all moves that smite, however absurd they may look at first glance, he is on the way to becoming a master of tactics. - Purdy

    • The tactician knows what to do when there is something to do; whereas the strategian knows what to do when there is nothing to do. - Gerald Abrahams

    • Examine moves that smite! A good eye for smites is far more important than a knowledge of strategical principles. - Purdy

    • The scheme of a game is played on positional lines; the decision of it, as a rule, is effected by combinations. - Reti

    • In the perfect chess combination as in a first-rate short story, the whole plot and counter-plot should lead up to a striking finale, the interest not being allayed until the very last moment. -Yates and Winter

    • A thorough understanding of the typical mating continuations makes the most complicated sacrificial combinations leading up to them not only not difficult, but almost a matter of course. - Tarrasch

    • It's always better to sacrifice your opponent's men. - Tartakover

    Middlegame

    • The middlegame I repeat is chess itself; chess with all its possibilities, its attacks, defences, sacrifices, etc. - Znosko-Borovsky

    • Before the endgame, the gods have placed the middlegame. - Tarrasch

    Endgame

    • Every pawn is a potential Queen. - Mason

    • The Passed Pawn is a criminal, who should be kept under lock and key. Mild measures, such as police surveillance, are not sufficient. - Nimzovich

    • A Passed Pawn increases in strength as the number of pieces on the board diminishes. - Capablanca

    • Any material change in a position must come about by mate, a capture, or a Pawn -promotion. - Purdy

    Planning

    • Even a poor plan is better than no plan at all. - Mikhail Chigorin

    • It is not a move, even the best move, that you must seek, but a realisable plan. - Znosko-Borovsky

    Analysis

    • Methodical thinking is of more use in chess than inspiration. - Purdy

    • Chess is the art of analysis. - Botvinnik

    • Chess mastery essentially consists of analysing chess positions accurately. - Botvinnik

    • Half the variations which are calculated in a tournament game turn out to be completely superfluous. Unfortunately, no one knows in advance which half - Jan Tinman

    "Chess is a good mistress but a bad master." - Gerald Abrahams (1907-1980)

    "In chess there is a world of intellectual values." - Gerald Abrahams (1907-1980)

    "Chess will always be the master of us all." - Alexander Alekhine (1892-1946)

    "Of all the drugs in the world, chess must be the most permanently pleasurable." - Assaic

    "In chess, just as in life, today's bliss may be tomorrow's poison." - Assaic

    "To have a knight planted in your game at K6 is worse than a rusty nail in your knee." - Efim Bogoljubow (1889-1952)

    "Chess is the art of analysis." - Mikhail Botvinnik (1911-1995)

    "Chess is the art which expresses the science of logic." - Mikhail Botvinnik (1911-1995)

    "The essence of chess is thinking about what chess is." - David Bronstein (1924- )

    "The good player is always lucky." - Jose Capablanca (1888-1942)

    "Chess is not for the timid." - Irving Chernev (1900-1981)

    "Chess players are madmen of a certain quality, the way the artist is supposed to be, and isn't, in general." - Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968)

    "Not all artists may be chess players, but all chess players are artists." - Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) (1887-1968)

    "I am still a victim of chess. It has all the beauty of art - and much more. It cannot be commercialized. Chess is much purer than art in its social position." - Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968)

    "Chess holds its master in its own bonds, shakling the mind and brain so that the inner freedom of the very strongest must suffer." - Alburt Einstein (1879-1955)

    "A man that will take back a move at chess will pick a pocket." - Richard Fenton (1837-1916)

    "You can only get good at chess if you love the game." - Bobby Fischer (1943- )

    "I like to make them squirm." - Bobby Fischer (1943- )

    "If I win, I'm a genius. If I don't, I'm not." - Bobby Fischer (1943- )

    "Chess is life." - Bobby Fischer (1943- )

    "Life is a kind of chess, with struggle, competition, good and ill events." - Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)

    "You cannot play chess if you are kind-hearted." - French proverb

    "Excellence at chess is one mark of a scheming mind." - Sherlock Holmes

    "Chess is a sea in which a gnat may drink and an elephant may bathe." - Indian Proverb

    "Chess is everything: art, science, and sport." - Anatoly Karpov (1951- )

    "Chess is a test of wills." - Paul Keres (1916-1975)

    "Chess is a cure for headaches." - John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946)

    "I often play a move I know how to refute." - Bent Larsen (1935- )

    "On the chessboard lies and hypocrisy do not survive long." - Emanuel Lasker (1868-1941)

    "Chess is only a recreation and not an occupation." - Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924)

    "The hardest part of chess is winning a won game." - Frank Marshall (1877-1944)

    "Never make a good move too soon." - James Mason (1849-1905)

    "It is impossible to win gracefully at chess." - Alan Milne (1882-1956)

    "Help your pieces so they can help you." - Paul Morphy (1837-1884)

    "The isolated pawn casts gloom over the entire chessboard." - Aaron Nimzovich (1886-1935)

    "The loser is always at fault." - Vasily Panov (1906-1973)

    "Chess is the gymnasium of the mind." - Blaise Pascal

    "The pawn is the soul of chess." - Francois-Andre Danican Philidor (1726-1795)

    "Pawn endings are to chess what putting is to golf." - Cecil Purdy (1906-1979)

    "Chess is a fighting game which is purely intellectual and includes chance." - Richard Reti (1889-1929)

    "The Queen's Gambit is like a piece of dead fish kept overlong on ice." - Tony Santasiere (1904-1977)

    "Chess is a foolish expedient for making idle people believe they are doing something very clever, when they are only wasting their time." - George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950)

    "Chess is ruthless: you've got to be prepared to kill people." - Nigel Short (1965- )

    "Chess is a cold bath for the mind." - Sir John Simon

    "Chess is a game of bad moves." - Andrew Soltis (1947- )

    "Only the player with the initiative has the right to attack." - William Steinitz (1836-1900)

    "Between the opening and endgame the gods have placed the middlegame." - Siegbert Tarrasc(1862-1934) (1862-1934)

    "Chess, like love, like music, has the powers to make men happy." - Siegbert Tarrasch (1862-1934)

    "When you don't know what to do, wait for you opponent to get an idea; it is sure to be bad." - Siegbert Tarrasch (1862-1934)

    "White lost because he failed to remember the right continuation and had to think up the moves himself." - Siegbert Tarrasch (1862-1934)

    "All chessplayers should have a hobby." - Savielly Tartakower (1887-1956)

    "Tactics is knowing what to do when there is something to do; strategey is knowing what to do when there is nothing to do." - Savielly Tartakower (1887-1956)

    "It is always better to sacrifice your opponent's men." - Savielly Tartakower (1887-1956)

    "A chess player who resigns gracefully never intended to win anyway." - Bill Wall (1951- )

    "Chess players never die. They just lose their mates." - Bill Wall (1951- )

    "The hardest chess position to win is stalemate." -Bill Wall (1951- )

    "Don't eat beans and bananas before a chess match." - Bill Wall (1951- )

    "There is no remorse like a remorse of chess. It is a curse upon man. There is no happiness in chess." - H.G. Wells (1886-1946)

    "Chess is like marriage. You cannot have a mate without a check." - Brian Wood