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Chess Quotations

Chess Is . . .

Chess, with all its philosophical depth, its aesthetic appeal, is first of all a game in the best sense of the word; a game in which are revealed your intellect, character, will. – Boris Spassky

By some ardent enthusiasts, chess has been elevated into a science or an art. It is neither; but its principal characteristic seems to be what human nature most delights in - a fight. – Emanuel Lasker

If chess is a science, it's a most inexact one. If chess is an art, it's too exacting to be seen as one. If chess is a sport, it's too esoteric. If chess is a game, it's too demanding to be "just" a game. If chess is a mistress, she's a demanding one. If chess is a passion, it's a rewarding one. If chess is life, it's a sad one. – Source Unknown

If chess is an art, Alekhine. If chess is a science, Capablanca. If chess is a struggle, Lasker. – Saviely Tartakower (on who was the greatest chess player)

Chess is a form of intellectual productiveness, therein lies its peculiar charm. Intellectual productiveness is one of the greatest joys - if not the greatest one - of human existence. It is not everyone who can write a play, or build a bridge, or even make a good joke. But in chess everyone can, everyone must be intellectually productive, and so can share in this select delight. I have always a slight feeling of pity for the man who has no knowledge of chess, just as I would pity the man who has remained ignorant of love. Chess, like love, like music, has the power to make men happy. – Siegbert Tarrasch

It is a game too troublesome for some men's braines, too full of anxiety, all out as bad as study; and besides it is a testy cholericke game and very offensive to him that looseth the mate. – Robert Burton

I warne yow wel, it is no childes pley. – Geoffrey Chaucer

Chess is so interesting in itself, that those who have leisure for such diversions cannot find one that is more innocent, but advantageous, to the vanquished as well as the victor. – Benjamin Franklin

Everyone can define chess in their own way. But in the first place chess is sport, because what we are really interested in is the name of the winner. However, I think that one’s desire to win is not productive, unless it is grounded by one’s striving to fight and to create something beautiful. But on the other hand, one can’t be constantly winning when occupied with creating masterpieces. With me, however, as long as I have a desire to seek something new and to play beautiful games, I continue to win. – Garry Kasparov

The game of the Gods. Infinite possibilities. – Vladimir Nabokov

The battle for the ultimate truth will never be won. And that's why chess is so fascinating. – Hans Kmoch

Chess is a good way to learn, to keep the brain fit and the ego in check, a mental form of your local gymnasium. Those who see chess merely as a means of self-proof make the game experience uncomfortable and drive many of the better, more sensitive brains to analysis, correspondence, problems, studies and the like. – Abelard

There's something in the British psyche. We're very good at being buccaneers and pirates, and we're very good at being merchant bankers. Chess is very much like that, a sort of piracy of the mind, a sort of opportunism. – Raymond Keene

Chess is in its essence a game, in its form an art, and in its execution a science. – Baron Tassilo von Heyderbrand und der Lasa

There is no other game so esteemed, so profound and so venerable as chess. In the realm of play, it stands alone in dignity. – Ely Culbertson

Not without reason is it the one game that, since its invention around A. D. 600, has been played in most of the world, has captivated the imagination and interest of millions, and has been the source of great sorrows and great pleasures. – Norman Reider

For surely, of all the drugs in the world, chess must be the most permanently pleasurable. – Assiac

If drink is the curse of the working classes and work is the curse of the drinking classes then chess is the curse of the thinking classes. – J. Ross

Chess is a kind of mental alcohol… unless a man has supreme self-control. It is better that he should not learn to play chess. I have never allowed my children to learn it, for I have seen too much of its evil results. – Henry Blackburne

Chess is a terrible game. If you have no center, your opponent has a freer position. If you do have a center, then you really have something to worry about! – Siegbert Tarrasch

Chess is eminently and emphatically the philosopher's game. – Paul Morphy

Those who rely on chance should play cards or roulette. Chess is something quite different. – Tigran Petrosian

The point is that chess doesn’t have a strict criterion of correctness. Chess is a multiform game! – Bent Larsen

For me chess is certainly more than a game - it is my profession. Chess embodies art and creativity. Twenty years ago it was much more of a creative activity than it is today. In those days you had to mainly rely on your own creativity but today there are many other factors such as computers and trainers, which can outweigh that creativity. – Judit Polgar

A chess game is a work of art between minds, which need to balance two sometimes-disparate goals - to win, and to produce beauty. – Vasily Smyslov

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

Chess is only a game and not to be classed with business, science, technology, not to speak of religion, philosophy or the arts. No one desires to see players devote to chess such time as they need for serious purposes. – Emanuel Lasker

Judging by its checkered past and recent history, chess is an imperfect game perpetually striving to find its perfect form. There is no reason to believe that this process will not continue; on the contrary, sooner or later, probably within a century or two, the game called chess will be different from the game we play today. – Burt Hochberg

Chess is not a fixed or static body of knowledge. It is dynamic. – Garry Kasparov

Taking the long historical view, we may say that modern chess is a game in transition. We know what it was and what it is, but we can't yet know what it will be. – Burt Hochberg

The essence of chess is thinking about what chess is. – David Bronstein

Chess, which severely eliminates accident, is a forcing house where the fruits of character can ripen more fully than in life. – E. M. Forster

Chess is a sport. A violent sport. This detracts from its most artistic connections. One intriguing aspect of the game that does not imply artistic connotations is the geometrical patterns and variations of the actual set-up of the pieces in the combinative, tactical, strategical and positional sense. It is a sad means of expression though - somewhat like religious art - it is not very gay. If it is anything, it is a struggle. – Marcel Duchamp

Chess is a sport. The main object in the game of chess remains the achievement of victory. – Max Euwe

Chess really is a universal game that cuts across all of those artificial boundaries we set up to segregate ourselves from our fellow human beings. – Steve Lopez

It's an alternative lifestyle. – Sarah Hurst

I see chess as an allegory for life. The point is it's a contest between two opponents. – Weldon McDonald

Chess is 99 percent tactics. – Richard Teichmann

Chess is 99 percent calculation. – Andrew Soltis

Chess IS tactics! – Ignacio Marin

Chess is the greatest game ever invented, because it only looks like a game. – Scott Kerns

Chess - now there’s a game of kings. Civilized, strategic. – Tim Robbins (The Shawshank Redemption)

Chess is an art appearing in the form of a game. –From a Soviet encyclopedia

Chess is imagination. – David Bronstein

Chess is not an equation. – Source Unknown

Chess is a game of bad moves. – Andrew Soltis

Chess is a fairy tale of 1,001 blunders. – Saviely Tartakower

Chess is the struggle against error. – Johannes Zukertort

Chess is not for timid souls. – Wilhelm Steinitz

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

Chess is only a recreation and not an occupation. – Vladimir Lenin

Chess, like love, is infectious at any age. – Salo Flohr

Chess will always be the master of us all. – Alexander Alekhine

Chess is vanity. – Alexander Alekhine

Chess is a good mistress but a bad master. – Gerald Abrahams

Chess is a beautiful mistress to whom we keep coming back, no matter how many times she rejects us. – Bent Larsen

Chess is one long regret. – Stephen Leacock

Chess is not a game but a disease. – Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman

Chess, like mathematics and music, is a nursery for child prodigies. – Jamie Murphy

Chess is not like life - it has rules! – Mark Pasternak

Chess is what it's all about. – William H. Nulf

Chess is profoundly trivial and trivially profound...a universe simultaneously closed and unbounded. – George Steiner

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

Chess is intellectual gymnastics. – Wilhelm Steinitz

Chess is the gymnasium of the mind. – Peter Pratt (also incorrectly attributed to Blaise Pascal, Yakov Rokhlin & Vladimir Lenin)

Chess is the touchstone of the intellect. – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Chess is to the mind, what physical exercise is to the body. – Kelly Atkins

Chess is a test of wills. – Paul Keres

Chess is a game of quiet intensity. – Ralph L. Hall

Chess is a cure for headaches. – John Maynard Keynes

Chess, first of all, is art. – Mikhail Tal

Chess is on a level with the other arts. – Alexander Alekhine

Chess is the only sport where you remain competitive after sixty. – Eugene Martinovsky

A game of chess is not an examination of knowledge; it is a battle of nerves. – David Bronstein

At the highest level, chess is a talent to control unrelated things. It is like controlling chaos. – Garry Kasparov

Chess is a fighting game, which is purely intellectual and includes chance. – Richard Reti

Chess is too serious to be enjoyable, and too frivolous to be worth taking seriously. – Source Unknown

Chess is too much to be merely a game but too little to be anything more. – Source Unknown

Chess is just a rhyme without a reason. – Source Unknown

Chess is the art of human reason. – Gustavus Selenius

Chess is the art of analysis. – Mikhail Botvinnik

Chess is a game for strong people with strong character. – Mikhail Botvinnik

Chess is no whit inferior to the violin, and we have a large number of professional violinists. – Mikhail Botvinnik

Chess is a part of culture and if a culture is declining then chess too will decline. – Mikhail Botvinnik

Chess is first of all a game, but if any succeeds in producing a game which keeps on living and is played over and over again for many years, chess becomes an art. – Mikhail Botvinnik

Chess is the art, which expresses the science of logic. – Mikhail Botvinnik

Chess - a Tragedy In One Tempo! – Source Unknown

Chess is as much a mystery as women. – C. J. S. Purdy

Chess is beautiful enough to waste your life for. – Hans Ree

It is too beautiful to spend your life upon. – Emanuel Lasker

Chess is above all a fight. – Emanuel Lasker

Chess is a storm against man. – Mikhail Tal

Chess is war over the board. The object is to crush the opponent's mind. – Bobby Fischer

Chess is mental torture. – Garry Kasparov

Chess is a black and white jungle. – Garry Kasparov

Chess is war; chess is all about testosterone-driven primal screams. – Garry Kasparov

Chess is not an easy lay. – Burt Hochberg

Chess is everything: art, science, and sport. – Anatoly Karpov

Chess is life in miniature. Chess is struggle, chess is battles. – Garry Kasparov

Chess is life. – Bobby Fischer

Chess is a game. Chess is a battle. Chess is war. It is art, science, logic, and beauty. Chess is the ultimate contest between two minds. Chess is the mental torture of one's opponent, and the mental torture of oneself. Chess is drama. It is tragedy. It is tears and frustration. Chess is despair. Chess is laughter, joy, and triumph. Chess is a friendship formed through a contest. Chess is 16 pieces, 32 men, 64 squares. It is openings and endgames, tactics and strategy. Chess is combinations. Chess is planning. Chess is the sharpening of the mind, the exercise of the brain. Chess is thinking. Chess is pure thought. Chess is tension, toil, and strife. Chess is losing. Chess is winning. Chess is beating and being beaten. Chess is where all excuses fail. Chess is a hobby, a mania, a fixation. Chess is an addiction. Chess is a waste of time. Chess is a distraction. Chess is passion. Chess is truth. Chess is life. – Daniel White

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