Chess Theory Quotes

By the time a player becomes a Grandmaster, almost all of his training time is dedicated to work on this first phase. The opening is the only phase that holds out the potential for true creativity and doing something entirely new.

Combination is a soul of chess.

I didn't know so well chess theory, the theory of chess openings. And so, of course I knew the theory, but not on the level of the best players, so this was my... this was always my weakness.

Modern Chess is too much concerned with things like Pawn structure. Forget it, Checkmate ends the game

A lifetime in not enough to learn everything about chess.

In chess, as a purely intellectual game, where randomness is excluded, - for someone to play against himself is absurd ... It is as paradoxical, as attempting to jump over his own shadow.

A grandmaster must memorize thousands of chess duels in his head, as these are for him what words of the mother tongue are to the ordinary people and what notes are to a musician.

His teaching became a turning point in chess history: it was from Steinitz that the era of modern chess began. The contribution of the first world champion to its development is comparable with the great scientific discoveries of the 19th century.

Pitches are like pages of a book; they're so important. The chess game; how I set you up early, and how I'll do it differently later.

Like Dvoretsky, I think that (all other things being equal), the analytical method of studying chess must give you a colossal advantage over the chess pragmatist, and that there can be no certainty in chess without analysis. I personally acquired these views from my sessions with Mikhail Botvinnik, and they laid the foundations of my chess-playing life.

I started by just sitting by the chessboard exploring things. I didn't even have books at first, and I just played by myself. I learnt a lot from that, and I feel that it is a big reason why I now have a good intuitive understanding of chess.

Many persons have been confused and discouraged at the very outset of the study by the great variety and the delicate distinctions of the openings: and this has constituted a fault in many otherwise excellent manuals for the learner.

Capablanca did not apply himself to opening theory (in which he never therefore achieved much), but delved deeply into the study of end-games and other simple positions which respond to technique rather than to imagination.

Chess continues to advance over time, so the players of the future will inevitably surpass me in the quality of their play, assuming the rules and regulations allow them to play serious chess. But it will likely be a long time before anyone spends 20 consecutive years as number, one as I did.

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.

He is the so-called father of the modern school of chess; before him, the King was considered a weak piece and players set out to attack the King directly. Steinitz claimed that the King was well able to take care of itself, and ought not to be attacked until one had some other positional advantage. He understood more about the use of squares than Morphy and contributed a great deal more to chess theory.

In chess, we have styles - like in any other field. There are also fashions in the kinds of systems that people play. So I'm trying to know my opponent as much as possible.

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.

That which Steinitz gave to the theoretical aspect of the game when he was at his best is very remote to all out home-bred chess philosophers, but with his views on Morphy, whom he tries to discredit completely, it is of course impossible to agree.

I know that with perfect play, God versus God, Fritz versus Fritz, chess is a draw.

Chess is an infinitely complex game, which one can play in infinitely numerous and varied ways.

All that matters on the chessboard is good moves.

Online it is much more important to have good quick instincts and the nature of opening preparations changes too, as there is less time to delve deep into the position once the computer preparation ends.

I would say, you have a unique chance of learning more about the game of chess with your computer than Bobby Fischer, or even myself, could manage throughout our entire lives. What is very important is that you will use this power productively and you will not be hijacked by the computer screen. Always keep your personality intact.