My Chess Blog

" And it's then, with immense clarity of vision, that I see how easy it would be to remove myself from this tedium (of life) if I just had the strength truly to want to do so " - Fernando Pessoa  The great Portugal thinker further added.... " Those of us - be we geniuses or beggars - who do not know how to want in our shard impotence.... " " Shared impotence "...... impotence ..., which is wrongly assumed as ' importance ' a phonetic error perhaps, which lead humanity to struggle under delusion! Every one in this world, assume an identity - a condition which imposes further conditions - based on which humans act at every moment and do whatever they do, assuming a false certainty in a world which is full of chaos and where chaos rules order and..... perhaps, an order lies underneath the chaos! Frank Wilczek - a nobel laureate quantum physicist - began is wonderful book with these words: " The Universe is not what it used to be, nor what it...

Times Correspondent: " Why do good players lose ?" Answer (Tartakover): " The board is full of mistakes, waiting to be made "  As the saying goes, good positions do not lead to a win, rather good moves lead to a win ! To play good moves consistently is the supreme talent which only great players possess - you have only handful in the history of Chess! They too are not immune to mistakes....but commit them on very few occasions compared to others. It is something similar to this assumption: if in Tennis or Shuttle Badminton or in Table Tennis, if a player is capable of putting the ball (or shuttle cock) into the other side of the net, successfully returning it, then he would never lose. It never happens! So..... in Chess! Playing good moves consistently is almost imposible even for the greatest! Then comes the most intriguing question, What is a good move? It is hard to define a good move as it is highly subjective. Suffice to say, a move is good if it sufficiently c...

 "The basis for a game of Chess is a purposeful plan which, beginning in the opening, is consistently developed in the middlegame. The link between opening and middlegame is of topical significance. Together, we shall consider the problem of assessing a position and analysing - undoubtedly the paramount question of Chess theory. It should be borne in mind that any of these problems can only be studied succssfully given a critical, imaginative approach to them" - Isaac Lipnitsky The great authority of opening theory, during the pre-computer era; Lajos Portisch , observed, " Your only task in the opening is to reach a playable middlegame " Very true! But what is a playable middlegame!? There lies the beauty and depth of chess as it means very different at different levels of mastery and even amongst the greatest masters of Chess, it is defined by factors which are beyond comprehension!  Playable Middlegame is a very broad term! Bronstein wrote in the preface to ...

" The experienced player will learn to distinguish which weaknesses to avoid and which to endure " - William Lombardy ......yet, we find even top players get into committing some serious weakness, time and again! When Tenjiku was asked about the incident of Tanka burning the statue, he replied, " When it is cold we gather around the hearth by the fire" " Was he wrong or not ?" persisted the monk. " When it is hot we sit in a bamboo forest in the valley ," said Tenjiku Chess ideally should be played like this, your opponent should not understand what you play! And for this to happen, you should also have no or less clarity on what is happening! The act of creation should be consigned to tacit integration. Mikhael Polanyi wrote, "Since particulars are more tangible, their knowledge offers a true conception of things is fundamentally mistaken".  In chess, moves or more precisely sequence of moves calculated in advance gives an illusion o...

 "A position can never be so bad as not to offer prospects of defence, and therein lies the great truth"  - Lasker/Kere s The Art of Defence in Chess is underplayed, chiefly for two reasons: 1) It is presumed to be dull and devoid of sparks that an attack produces 2) Simply it is very difficult to understand Defence is very difficult to understand because, the choices made cannot be substantiated by objective truth, it is tedious to annotate a defensive game. A game of chess is won because a side commits or overextends the logic inherent in the position or the resources that a position offers and plays inappropriate moves, disturbing the equilibrium badly. Art of successful defence is also about disturbing the equilibrium so as to confuse the side with upper hand or at least put the player with upper hand in discomfort by taking him or her from the path of least resistance! Fischer rightly said, " Chess is a fine art of knowing when to duck and how to punch "! Gary...

  Gens Una Sumus - FIDE motto The world needs to realise what the above means in spirit and action .... the fights on account of religion, land, power has divided the world enough! Time has come to unite and eradicate hatred in all forms .......else we will perish soon . Let the fightings and killings stop! What best, other than the sport, which is the greatest unitor and leveler! There is no winner or loser in true sport, no place for hegmony, discrimination and differences, hatred..... A tamil poet by name Pulamai Pithan wrote..... காற்றும் நீரும் வானும் நெருப்பும் பொதுவில் இருக்குது மனிதன் காலில் பட்ட பூமி மட்டும் பிரிந்து கிடக்குது பிரித்து வைத்து பார்ப்பதெல்லாம் மனிதன் இதயமே உலகில் பிரிவு மாறி ஒருமை வந்தால் அமைதி நிலவுமே The air, water, sky and fire lies common for everyone but the land on which humans have tread, is fractured .....under the garb of nation, religious fanatisicm ..... the greed for power and money ....... Only human beings discriminate things and the day when...