“I suspect ‘chess rage’ & ‘road rage’ are neighbouring neural impulses.”

November 15, 2015 2:44 PM

An Art Without an Artwork By Tom Russell [Guernica Magazine] A summer of chess in Bryant Park.

“Another way to distinguish a great chess player from an average one is to gauge how comfortable he or she is with tension. After the opening flurry of moves it is inevitable that a tension accrue somewhere on the board—a cluster of opposing pieces all vying for control of a vital square. The temptation for most is to resolve that tension by trading off pieces and simplifying the position. Experts let it build and build, and pounce only when they identify a clear way to gain an advantage. Everything you’d want to know about a person psychologically is there to see on the chessboard.”

posted by Fizz (11 comments total)

I usually yammer about Sun Tsu, gesticulate with a lit Barclay and leggy Dewars until the opponent invokes the silence rule.

Then I lose or replace the white rook with a Bic.
posted by clavdivs at 2:59 PM on November 15, 2015

What's the equivalent of passing a truck .5mph faster in chess?
posted by michaelh at 3:10 PM on November 15, 2015 [1 favorite]

I used to play. The only real compliment I ever got was from a guy with a ranking. He said, in effect, that my game was terrible but he enjoyed playing me because I was always seeing things and doing things that had never occurred to him. One of life's little limited victories...
posted by jim in austin at 3:18 PM on November 15, 2015 [5 favorites]

Thanks for posting this essay.

The last competitive game I played, I made a spectacular sequence of moves in which I traded my queen for two minor pieces, exchanged a rook and a knight, and stormed up the board with my remaining knight, rook and bishop pair, maintaining a relentless tempo all the way until I had a beautiful combination for mate that would smother the king against his own pawns—and then I played the final sequence in the wrong order. He still had no way to escape the mating net, but because my first move wasn't a check he was able to move his queen down the board and force a draw by repetition.

And he had sniggered at my queen exchange when I had played it.

Honestly, it was like putting the final touch on the most beautiful painting you've ever created, in front of the critic who most despises you, after so many years of study and practice, standing up in triumph and then promptly tripping and falling through the canvas.

Which then inexplicably bursts into flames, because nobody else is watching your game, nobody's been writing down the moves, you've already forgotten what the position looked like before you made the queen move that changed it all... I can't even remember now whether I was white or black or which opening we played.


An art without an artwork, indeed. What a fantastic metaphor.
posted by president of the solipsist society at 4:47 PM on November 15, 2015 [20 favorites]

I've never had the head for chess, but as an avid backgammon player, this really rings true. Those of us who are obsessed with games are really an odd bunch.
posted by TheCoug at 9:17 PM on November 15, 2015

On my best day, I play at a rating of about 1600, which is slightly above average for an avid player.

Author is probably about USCF 1400, like every single player I have ever heard announce that they are really about 1600 strength. (The 1600 players think that they are 1800).
posted by thelonius at 11:23 PM on November 15, 2015 [3 favorites]

Russell is one hell of a writer, and this was a mostly enjoyable read. The one part I didn't care for at all for began "It’s one thing to lose to a guy like Paul...." The snobbishness took me right out of the story.

Still, that was one bad moment in an otherwise excellent essay which I'm glad to have read, and which I will read again. I really like chess. I wish I was good enough to sit at a kids table and play.
posted by bryon at 12:08 AM on November 16, 2015 [1 favorite]

This is how I ride elevators!
posted by srboisvert at 5:32 AM on November 16, 2015

Author is probably about USCF 1400, like every single player I have ever heard announce that they are really about 1600 strength. (The 1600 players think that they are 1800).

Yup. If "on your best day you are about 1600", then you are probably about 1400. That's how variation in performance works. (A 1600 can beat a 1400 three quarters of the time, so this is not a trivial difference.)
posted by dfan at 5:47 AM on November 16, 2015

He's probably 1400 on his best day then. The ego inherent to chess players + self-estimated rating based on blitz games and no rated tournaments = take a big discount off the number
posted by thelonius at 7:07 AM on November 16, 2015

What's the equivalent of passing a truck .5mph faster in chess?

Promoting your pawns to knights and bishops and refusing to checkmate your opponent because you want the game to last longer.
posted by Obscure Reference at 8:16 AM on November 16, 2015 [1 favorite]