On the Importance of Strategy

Chess and Football: Let’s Learn Strategy! There was a time when, in both football and chess, England was No 1. China has adapted well to both sports, and should be a world force in both before you are 45. Meanwhile, you must wait. And you know how hard you find it to wait  for even ten seconds! England, meanwhile, eventually failed miserably in the second sphere. The great time for chess in England, as in so much else, was from about 1965 to 1980. 1980 maximum... We used to say: ‘There will always be an England!’ Now – foreigners ask (and anxiously as well!) ‘There will always be a Liverpool?’ And: ‘There will always be a Manchester United’?’ It’s not so sure! England today is where China was in the days of your great-grandfathers. Do not worry about English. Worry about England. You need a place to dream of and go to and to speak of, and in. Hope. Study. Maybe, above all – pray! When I was young, one of the world’s top chess players came from Birmingham. He was my age. This was before Harry Potter. Maybe he looked a bit like Harry Potter, although his hair was a lot longer. He contributed to Chess Theory; and has – sadly – passed away now. Quite young. Tony Miles. He was just over 45. Needless to say, he beat me when we were both eleven. ‘Shall we continue on paper?’ he asked me – when our schcool lessons interfered with finishing our game. We did; he won in five minutes and went on to world glory and an early death. I – no chess player – am still here. We can remember Tony Miles and ask ourselves if he maybe has something to tell us today... Football was invented in England, but chess was invented in India. It spread to Iran in the 7th century as shatranj, and the earliest versions involved a piece called the Elephant. The King was called the Raja. Originally Kings did not face each other. Chess is still called ‘shadraki’ in Georgia and ‘shakhmat’ in Armenia.’Check’ means the King is in danger and ‘Mate’ means he has been killed and the game is over. Chess is to Europe what Mahjong is to Asia. You have Rice, we have Bread. You have the Universal, we have the Particular. You have Mahjong – but we have Chess. And you do not have Breakfast. And although General Strang – in the film about aliens – Arrival – which we shall study – used Mahjong to try and communicate with the Heptapods – and he failed! Only Louise, the Westerner, managed: she saved him; and at the same time – she saved the world from a nuclear holocaust. Maybe you will do it next time. To be clear – she did this with chess; she did it with strategy. And strategy is the subject of today’s fifth and final introductory Lecture. In Chinese it is simply ‘Qi’.