Best 681 quotes in «chess quotes» category

Unfortunately, many regard the critic as an enemy, instead of seeing him as a guide to the truth.

Until computers and robots make quantum advances, they basically remain adding machines: capable only of doing things in which all the variables are controlled and predictable. Robots are bad at pattern recognition and certainly at common sense. That's why computers can beat humans in chess but can't have even a basic conversation with a six-year-old.

Universality is the distinguishing mark of genius. There is no such thing as a special genius, a genius for mathematics, or for music, or even for chess, but only a universal genius. The genius is a man who knows everything without having learned it.

Unless a player has an 'understanding chess' rating of at least 2400, the amount of significant knowledge that he can impart on others is limited.

We cannot resist the fascination of sacrifice, since a passion for sacrifices is part of a Chessplayer's nature

We can compare classical chess and rapid chess with theatre and cinema - some actors don't like the latter and prefer to work in the theatre.

Watching the season for me is about watching the chess matches.

We should talk over the lessons of the day, or lose them in Music, Chess, or the merriments of our family companions.

We don't really know how the game was invented, though there are suspicions. As soon as we discover the culprits, we'll let you know

We often hear the terms 'positional' and 'tactical' used as opposites. But this is as wrong as to consider a painting's composition unrelated to its subject. Just as there is no such thing as 'artistic' art, so there is no such thing as 'positional' chess.

We've seen computers play chess and beat grand masters. We've seen computers drive a car across a desert. But interestingly, playing chess is easy, but having a conversation about nothing is really difficult for a computer.

What work I have done I have done because it has been play. If it had been work I shouldn't have done it.

When everything on the board is clear it can be so difficult to conceal your thoughts from your opponent.

What do I do when we're not taping? Sit in a dark room and refine my plans for someday ruling Earth from a blimp. And chess.

What we need are lots of girls who aren't as good as us, who'll treat us with the proper respect and reverance.

When I was eleven, I just got good.

When Garri Kasparov wrestles with his conscience, he always wins. It's what he's best at.

When I speak of the beauty of a game of chess, then naturally this is subjective. Beauty can be found in a very technical, mathematical game for example. That is the beauty of clarity.

When my opponent's clock is going I discuss general considerations in an internal dialogue with myself. When my own clock is going I analyse conctrete variations.

When you defend, try not to worry or become upset. Keep your cool and trust your position - it's all you've got.

When Marx got into a difficult position he would get angry and losing a game would cause him to fly into a rage.

When you play against an experienced opponent who exploits all the defensive resources at his command you sometimes have to walk time and again, along the narrow path of 'the only move'.

When you have a World Champion in your smartphone, the myth of the superior brainpower of human chess champions has lost its power.

When you absolutely don't know what to do anymore, it is time to panic

When you're good at something, you should continue to do it. Too many players have stopped at a relatively young age.

While some are as loathe to trade a Bishop for a Knight as a Cadillac for a Chevrolet, others are prepared to do so without hesitation.

While all artists are not chess players, all chess players are artists.

White has no positional equivalent for the centralized pawn.

Whoever called snooker "chess with balls" was rude, but right.

With a name like that, he must be Catholic, right?

Within these premises, the only thing one can be is an impeccable mediator. One is not the player in this cosmic match of chess, one is simply a pawn on the chessboard. What decides everything is a conscious impersonal energy that sorcerers call intent or the Spirit.

Why do you have to use me to show off? If you want to show off, then why don't you learn to play chess." - Ch. 5

Which do I prefer? Sex or chess? It depends on the position.

With this mistake I deprived myself of the possibility to make a contribution to the treasury of chess art.

With or without the title, Bobby Fischer was unquestionably the greatest player of his time

Without technique it is impossible to reach the top in chess, and therefore we all try to borrow from Capablanca his wonderful, subtle technique.

You can permit yourself any liberty in the opening except the luxury of a passive position.

Women, by their nature, are not exceptional chess players: they are not great fighters.

Yeah, I used to dress badly until I was about sixteen. But people just didn't seem to have enough respect for me, you know And I didn't like that, so I decided I'd have to show them they weren't any better than me, you know? They were sort of priding themselves. They would say, 'He beat us at chess, but he's still just an uncouth kid.' So I decided to dress up.

You must be able to handle a variety of move orders during the first 5-6 moves - otherwise you'll find yourself 'tricked' time and time again.

You know I'm finished with the old chess because it's all just a lot of book and memorization you know.

Your only task in the opening is to reach a playable middlegame.

Your practical results will improve when you play what you know, like and have confidence in.

You know, comrade Pachman, I don't enjoy being a Minister, I would rather play chess like you, or make a revolution in Venezuela.

And perhaps it was precisely because she knew nothing at all about chess that chess for her was not simply a parlor game or a pleasant pastime, but a mysterious art equal to all the recognized arts. She had never been in close contact with such people — there was no one to compare him with except those inspired eccentrics, musicians and poets whose image one knows as clearly and as vaguely as that of a Roman Emperor, an inquisitor or a comedy miser. Her memory contained a modest dimly lit gallery with a sequence of all the people who had in any way caught her fancy.

Young players calculate everything, a requirement of their relative inexperience.

A deep laugh stirred in his chest, and his thumb brushed over the backs of her fingers before he withdrew his hand. She felt the rasp of a callus on his thumb, the sensation not unlike the tingling scrape of a cat’s tongue. Bemused by her own response to him, Annabelle looked down at the chess piece in her hand. “That is the queen—the most powerful piece on the board. She can move in any direction, and go as far as she wishes.” There was nothing overtly suggestive in his manner of speaking …but when he spoke softly, as he was doing at that moment, there was a husky depth in his voice that made her toes curl inside her slippers. “More powerful than the king?” she asked. “Yes. The king can only move one square at a time. But the king is the most important piece.” “Why is he more important than the queen if he’s not the most powerful?” “Because once he is captured, the game is over.

After an hour the score was: Quancita—34 Radiz—51 Sally—froglegs Perla—9 and 21 Me— hoo-hoo-hooo

and a most curious country it was. There were a number of tiny little brooks running straight across it from side to side, and the ground between was divided up into squares by a number of little green hedges, that reached from brook to brook. I declare it's marked out just like a large chessboard!' Alice said at last. 'There ought to be some men moving about somewhere--and so there are!' she added in a tone of delight, and her heart began to beat quick with excitement as she went on. 'It's a great huge game of chess that's being played--all over the world--if this is the world at all, you know. Oh, what fun it is!

A sound plan makes us all heroes, the absence of a plan, idiots