Chess Quotes - Page 17

• Has he some psychological antipathy to realism? I am no psychologist, and cannot say. The fact remains that Euwe commits the most inexplicable mistakes in thoroughly favorable positions, and that this weakness has consistently tarnished his record.

  Hans Kmoch

  Mistake, Weakness, Records

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• Chess is like war on a board

  Bobby Fischer

  War, Boards

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• Chess may be the deepest, least exhaustible of pastimes, but it is nothing more. As for a chess genius, he is a human being who focuses vast, little-understood mental gifts and labors on an ultimately trivial human enterprise.

  George Steiner

  Genius, May, Littles

  "The Sporting Scene: White Knights of Rekjavik". Book by George Steiner, 1972.

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• Nature supplies the game of chess with its implements; science with its system; art with its aesthetic arrangement of its problems; and God endows it with its blessed power of making people happy.

  Peter Weiss

  Art, Blessed, Games

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• Chess can be described as the movement of pieces eating one another.

  Marcel Duchamp

  Swag, Pieces, Movement

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• I feel as if I were a piece in a game of chess, when my opponent says of it: That piece cannot be moved.

  Soren Kierkegaard

  Frustration, Games, Chess Game

  Soren Kierkegaard (1946). “Either/or”

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• If you are going to make your mark among masters, you have to work far harder and more intensively, or, to put it more exactly, the work is far more complex than that needed to gain the title of Master.

  Mikhail Botvinnik

  Success, Gains, Titles

  Mikhail Botvinnik (2012). “Botvinnik: 100 Selected Games”, p.9, Courier Corporation

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• Blessed be the memory of him who gave the world this immortal game

  Alfred George Gardiner

  Memories, Blessed, Games

  Alfred George Gardiner (1917). “Pebbles on the shore”

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• It is a well known fact that almost all the outstanding chess-players have been first-class analysts.

  Mikhail Botvinnik

  Player, Class, Firsts

  Mikhail Botvinnik (2012). “Botvinnik: 100 Selected Games”, p.11, Courier Corporation

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• When you play Bobby, it is not a question if you win or lose. It is a question if you survive.

  Boris Spassky

  Winning, Chess Game, Play

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• A championship contender in the early twentieth century needed charisma and a knack for cultivating sponsorship, and Rubinstein was the epitome of the shy and unsocial chess player. Now matter how great his chess skills, he lacked the people skills to be a self-promoter and fund-raiser.

  Garry Kasparov

  Success, Player, Self

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• All chess players know what a combination is. Whether one makes it oneself, or is its victim, or reads of it, it stands out from the rest of the game and stirs one's admiration.

  Eugene Znosko-Borovsky

  Player, Games, Admiration

  Eugene Znosko-Borovsky (2013). “The Art of Chess Combination”, p.10, Courier Corporation

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• The world is not likely to tire of an amusement which never repeats itself, of a game which today presents features as novel and charms as fresh as those with which it delighted, in the morning of history, the dwellers on the banks of the Ganges and Indus.

  Willard Fiske

  Morning, Games, World

  Willard Fiske (1859). “The book of the first American chess congress: containing the proceedings of that celebrated assemblage, with the papers read in its sessions, the games played in the grand tournament, and the stratagems entered in the problem tournay ; together with sketches of the history of chess in the old and new worlds”, p.16

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• Let the perfectionist play postal.

  Yasser Seirawan

  Play, Playing Chess, Perfectionist

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• The fact that the 7 hours time control allows us to play a great deep game is not of great importance for mass-media.

  Alexei Shirov

  Time, Games, Play

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• A good sacrifice is one that is not necessarily sound but leaves your opponent dazed and confused.

  Nigel Short

  Confused, Sacrifice, Sound

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• Nothing excites jaded Grandmasters more than a theoretical novelty

  Dominic Lawson

  Playing Chess, Novelty, Jaded

  Dominic Lawson (1994). “End Game: Kasparov Vs. Short”, Harmony

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• Different people feel differently about resigning

  Bobby Fischer

  People, Different, Feels

  Bobby Fischer (2012). “My 60 Memorable Games: chess tactics, chess strategies with Bobby Fischer”, Pavilion Books

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• Place the contents of the Chess box in a hat, shake them up vigorously, pour them on the board from a height of two feet, and you get the style of Steinitz

  Henry Bird

  Two, Feet, Style

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• Nowadays, when you're not a grandmaster at 14, you can forget about it

  Viswanathan Anand

  Forget, Youngsters

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• Weak points or holes in the opponent's position must be occupied by pieces not Pawns

  Siegbert Tarrasch

  Chess Pieces, Opponents, Pawns

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• One of these modest little moves may be more embarrassing to your opponent than the biggest threat

  Siegbert Tarrasch

  Moving, Littles, May

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• A sacrifice is best refuted by accepting it

  Wilhelm Steinitz

  Sacrifice, Accepting

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• I have frequently stated that I regard chess as an art form, where creativity prevails over other factors.

  Vasily Smyslov

  Art, Creativity, Form

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• Along with my retirement from chess analytical work seems to have gone too.

  Mikhail Botvinnik

  Retirement, Analysis, Gone

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