Jim West On Chess: Chess, Not Guns

Sunday, April 29, 2007

Chess, Not Guns

Personally, I see chess as controlled violence. It allows two combatants at the board to settle their dispute in a civilized way. Unfortunately, in American society today, there is too much uncontrolled violence. We have too many schools with metal detectors, and not enough schools with chess programs.

Because I have on occasion written articles for Virginia Chess Newsletter, which is the official publication of the Virginia Chess Federation, the story of one chessplayer's heroism at the recent Virginia Tech tragedy hit home for me at more than one level. See what you think of it.

"My study of chess was accompanied by a strong attraction to music, and it was probably thanks to this that from childhood I became accustomed to thinking of chess as an art, and have never regarded it as anything else, for all the science and sport involved in it. And, moreover, an art which in some ways is closer to music than it is customary to think. Perhaps chess and music are drawn together by laws of harmony and beauty which are difficult to formulate and difficult to grasp, or perhaps by something else." - Vasily Smyslov