Chess has a long and rich history.  During this time, enormous amounts of literature have been produced on topics including basic instruction on how to play the game, in-depth studies analyzing strategies, tactics and openings, and biographies/essays on the players of the game.  The quotes below are only a taste of the wide range of literary works associated with chess, but they illustrate humankind's connection, fascination and frustration with a game that has been called an art, a science and a sport.  Enjoy!  

"The combination is born in the brain of a Chessplayer.  Many thoughts see the light there - true and false, strong and weak, sound and unsound.  They are born, jostle one another, and one of them, transformed into a move on the board, bears away the victory over its rivals."   - Emmanual Lasker

"Often at the chessboard we fail through simple ignorance rather than a lack of ideas, and on the verge of executing a magnificent combination we sit perplexed, at a loss how to realize it.  Inexperience makes the most fertile imagination powerless."  - Eugene Znosko-Borovsky

"Half the variations which are calculated in a tournament game turn out to be completely superfluous.  Unfortunately, no one knows in advance which half."  - Jan Timman

"Mistrust is the most necessary characteristic of the chessplayer."  - Siegbert Tarrasch

"When asked how many moves he saw ahead, Capablanca replied: 'Just one. The best one.'"   - GM Evans, Chess Life, p40, 3-06.

**If you have chess quotes you want to submit, send them to: nbeatty@missouristate.edu