Top 50 Chess Quotes of All Time

Great quotes store big and important ideas in just a few words. They transport wisdom
that great chess players have accumulated throughout decades of experience.This list
of quotes is for those who is aiming for big success. These quotes will both
motivate and educate you for becoming a better chess player.

1. "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." - Garry Kasparov

2. "When your house is on fire, you cant be bothered with the neighbors. Or, as we say
in chess, if your King is under attack, don't worry about losing a pawn on the
queenside." - Garry Kasparov
3. "By strictly observing Botvinnik's rule regarding the thorough analysis of one's own
games, with the years I have come to realize that this provides the foundation for the
continuos development of chess mastery." - Garry Kasparov
4. "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." - Garry Kasparov

5. "You can't overestimate the importance of psychology in chess, and as much as

some players try to downplay it, I believe that winning requires a constant and strong
psychology not just at the board but in every aspect of your life." - Garry Kasparov
6. "I ... have two vocations: chess and engineering. If I played chess only, I believe that
my success would not have been significantly greater. I can play chess well only when I
have fully convalesced from chess and when the 'hunger for chess' once more awakens

within me." - Mikhail Botvinnik

7. "If you are going to make your mark among masters, you have to work far harder and
more intensively, or, to put it more exactly, the work is far more complex than that
needed to gain the title of Master." - Mikhail Botvinnik
8. "Above all else, before playing in competitions a player must have regard to his
health, for if he is suffering from ill-health he cannot hope for success. In this connection
the best of all tonics is 15 to 20 days in the fresh air, in the country." - Mikhail Botvinnik
9. "If you are weak in the endgame, you must spend more time analysing studies; in
your training games you must aim at transposing to endgames, which will help you to
acquire the requisite experience." - Mikhail Botvinnik
10. "My forte was the middlegame. I had a good feeling for the critical moments of the
play. This undoubtedly compensated for my lack of opening preparation and, possibly,
not altogether perfect play in the endgame. In my games things often did not reach the
endgame!" - Boris Spassky
11. "The shortcoming of hanging pawns is that they present a convenient target for
attack. As the exchange of men proceeds, their potential strength lessens and during
the endgame they turn out, as a rule, to be weak." - Boris Spassky
12. "Of course, analysis can sometimes give more accurate results than intuition but
usually its just a lot of work. I normally do what my intuition tells me to do. Most of the
time spent thinking is just to double-check." - Magnus Carlsen
13. "I started by just sitting by the chessboard exploring things. I didnt 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." - Magnus Carlsen
14. "Self-confidence is very important. If you dont think you can win, you will take
cowardly decisions in the crucial moments, out of sheer respect for your opponent. You
see the opportunity but also greater limitations than you should. I have always believed

in what I do on the chessboard, even when I had no objective reason to. It is better to
overestimate your prospects than underestimate them." - Magnus Carlsen
15. "I didn't picture myself as even a grandmaster, to say nothing of aspiring to the
chess crown. This was not because I was timid - I wasn't - but because I simply lived in
one world, and the grandmasters existed in a completely different one. People like that
were not really even people, but like gods or mythical heroes." - Anatoly Karpov
16. "By all means examine the games of the great chess players, but don't swallow them
whole. Their games are valuable not for their separate moves, but for their vision of
chess, their way of thinking." - Anatoly Karpov
17. "The great mobility of the King forms one of the chief characteristics of all endgame
strategy. In the middlegame the King is a mere "super", in the endgame on the other
hand - on of the "principals". We must therefore develop him, bring him nearer to the
fighting line." - Aron Nimzowitsch
18. "If in a battle, I seize a bit of debatable land with a handful of soldiers, without having
done anything to prevent an enemy bombardment of the position, would it ever occur to
me to speak of a conquest of the terrain in question? Obviously not. Then why should I
do so in chess?" - Aron Nimzowitsch
19. "When I today ask myself whence I got the moral courage, for it takes moral courage
to make a move (or form a plan) running counter to all tradition, I think I may say in
answer, that it was only my intense preoccupation with the problem of the blockade
which helped me to do so." - Aron Nimzowitsch
20. "It is a well known phenomenon that the same amateur who can conduct the middle
game quite creditably, is usually perfectly helpless in the end game. One of the principal
requisites of good chess is the ability to treat both the middle and end game equally
well." - Aron Nimzowitsch
21. "In mathematics, if I find a new approach to a problem, another mathematician might

claim that he has a better, more elegant solution. In chess, if anybody claims he is better
than I, I can checkmate him." - Emanuel Lasker
22. "By positional play a master tries to prove and exploit true values, whereas by
combinations he seeks to refute false values ... A combination produces an unexpected
re-assessment of values." - Emanuel Lasker
23. "He who has a slight disadvantage plays more attentively, inventively and more
boldly than his antagonist who either takes it easy or aspires after too much. Thus a
slight disadvantage is very frequently seen to convert into a good, solid advantage." Emanuel Lasker
24. "A player, as the world believed he was, he was not, his studious temperament
made that impossible; and thus he was conquered by a player and in the end little
valued by the world, he died." - Emanuel Lasker
25. "It is no secret that any talented player must in his soul be an artist, and what could
be dearer to his heart and soul than the victory of the subtle forces of reason over crude
material strength! Probably everyone has his own reason for liking the King`s Gambit,
but my love for it can be seen in precisely those terms." - David Bronstein
26. "It is annoying that the rules of chess do not allow a pawn to take either horizontally
or backwards, but only forwards ... This psychological tuning is ideal for attacking
purposes, but what about for defence?" - David Bronstein
27. "If you have made a mistake or committed an inaccuracy there is no need to
become annoyed and to think that everything is lost. You have to reorientate yourself
quickly and find a new plan in the new situation." - David Bronstein
28. "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'." - David Bronstein

29. "Chess is not for the faint-hearted; it absorbs a person entirely. To get to the bottom
of this game, he has to give himself up into slavery. Chess is difficult, it demands work,
serious reflection and zealous research." - Wilhelm Steinitz
30. "The task of the positional player is systematically to accumulate slight advantages
and try to convert temporary advantages into permanent ones, otherwise the player with
the better position runs the risk of losing it." - Wilhelm Steinitz
31. "Whenever Black succeeds in assuming the initiative and maintaining it to a
successful conclusion, the sporting spirit of the chess lover feels gratified, because it
shows that the resources of the game are far from being exhausted." - Savielly
Tartakower
32. "No one ever won a game by resigning." - Savielly Tartakower
33. "It is always better to sacrifice your opponents' men." - Savielly Tartakower
34. "The blunders are all there on the board, waiting to be made." - Savielly Tartakower
35. "A thorough understanding of the typical mating continuations makes the most
complicated sacrificial combinations leading up to them not only difficult, but almost a
matter of course." - Savielly Tartakower
36. "All that matters on the chessboard is good moves." - Bobby Fischer
37. "A strong memory, concentration, imagination, and a strong will is required to
become a great chess player." - Bobby Fischer
38. "Tactics flow from a superior position." - Bobby Fischer
39. "To play for a draw, at any rate with white, is to some degree a crime against chess."
- Mikhail Tal

40. "I have always thought it a matter of honour for every chess player to deserve the
smile of fortune." - Mikhail Tal
41. "Naturally, the psychological susceptibility of a match participant is significantly
higher than a participant in a tournament, since each game substantially changes the
over-all position." - Mikhail Tal
42. "I go over many games collections and pick up something from the style of each
player." - Mikhail Tal
43. "Strategy requires thought, tactics require observation." - Max Euwe
44. "If it is true that a player's style is his person, then everyone plays as he is intended
to by nature. I am naturally cautious, and I altogether dislike situations which involve
risk." - Tigran Petrosian
45. "In almost any position the boundless possibilities of chess enable a new or at least
a little-studied continuation to be found." - Tigran Petrosian
46. "They knock me for my draws, for my style, they knock me for everything I do." Tigran Petrosian
47. "Even the most distinguished players have in their careers experienced severe
disappointments due to ignorance of the best lines or suspension of their own common
sense." - Tigran Petrosian
48. "In some places words have been replaced by symbols which, like amulets from a
witch's bag, have the power to consume the living spirit of chess." - Tigran Petrosian
49. "It is easy to play against the young players, for me they are like an open book." Tigran Petrosian
50. "They knock me for my draws, for my style, they knock me for everything I do." Tigran Petrosian

Analyzing well annotated chess games of great chess players should be one of the
priorities if your goal is to improve your positional understanding, or simply to become a
stronger chess player.