Chess as Art

I like Seth Godin’s definition of Art:

“Art is what we’re doing when we do our best work”.

We all enjoy Art, but creating the Art is more difficult and rare:

  • Many people read and enjoy books, but very few are good at writing them
  • Many people enjoy seeing paintings by Monet and Picasso in a museum, and appreciate their quality; very few actually create paintings, let alone ones that become classics
  • It’s relatively easy to read a computer program and understand what it does (or find a bug). It’s much more difficult to craft well designed computer programs.

Chess is no different. It’s fun to watch a game and observe brilliant moves. It’s much more difficult to make a brilliant move, especially when the clock is ticking.

 

The Marshall Swindle

We just saw “Tower Heist” with Ben Stiller & Eddie Murphy last night, and I have to say it’s a great movie.

In the movie, they mention “The Marshall Swindle”, a term coined after famous GM Frank James Marshal. The term is often used to mean “a diabolically clever move or combination that turns the tables on the opponent.”

I was intrigued and looked up the famous 1912 game.
Can you see what the next move is and why it’s so brilliant?