Emanuel Lasker



Emanuel Lasker (December 24, 1868 – January 11, 1941) was a German-born chess grandmaster, mathematician and philosopher who was World Chess Champion for 27 years.

Lasker's Manual of Chess (1925)
New York: Dover, 1960


 * On the chessboard, lies and hypocrisy do not survive long. The creative combination lays bare the presumption of a lie; the merciless fact, culminating in the checkmate, contradicts the hypocrite.
 * p. IX and 235 in the 1960 Dover edition; p. 183 in the 2008 edition


 * Our efforts in chess attain only a hundredth of one percent of their rightful result...Our education, in all domains of endeavour, is frightfully wasteful of time and values.
 * p. 337


 * Education in Chess has to be an education in independent thinking and judgement. Chess must not be memorized, simply because it is not important enough... Memory is too valuable to be stocked with trifles.
 * p. 337


 * You should keep in mind no names, nor numbers, nor isolated incidents, not even results, but only methods..The method produces numerous results; a few of these will remain in our memory, and as long as they remain few, they are useful to illustrate and to keep alive the rules which order a thousand results.
 * p. 338


 * He who wants to educate himself in Chess must evade what is dead in Chess...the habit of playing with inferior opponents; the custom of avoiding difficult tasks; the weakness of uncritically taking over variations or rules discovered by others; the vanity which is self-sufficient; the incapacity for admitting mistakes; in brief, everything that leads to standstill or to anarchy.
 * p. 338

Disputed

 * "Put two players against each other who both have perfect technique, who both avoid weaknesses, and what is left?&mdash;a sorry caricature of chess."

Misattributed

 * Although the adage "If you find a good move, look for a better one" is often attributed to Lasker, it actually dates earlier.

Quotes about Emanuel Lasker

 * It is no easy matter to reply correctly to Lasker's bad moves.
 * W. H. K. Pollock


 * My chess hero.
 * Viktor Korchnoi


 * The greatest of the champions was, of course, Emanuel Lasker.
 * Mikhail Tal