47+ Emanuel Lasker Quotes On Education, Religion And Socialism

Emanuel Lasker was a German chess player, mathematician, and philosopher who was World Chess Champion for 27 years. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest chess players of all time, and his achievements in the game earned him the nickname "The Immortal Lasker". He was also a prolific author, writing on a variety of topics including mathematics, philosophy, and psychology. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Emanuel Lasker on education, religion, leadership.

Top 10 Emanuel Lasker Quotes

1. When you see a good move, look for a better one.
2. Education in Chess has to be an education in independent thinking and judging. Chess must not be memorized.
3. 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.
4. The hardest game to win is a won game
5. Without error there can be no brilliancy
6. By some ardent enthusiasts Chess has been elevated into a science or an art. It is neither; but its principal characteristic seems to be - what human nature mostly delights in - a fight.
7. The laws of chess do not permit a free choice: you have to move whether you like it or not.
8. The combination player thinks forward; he starts from the given position, and tries the forceful moves in his mind
9. On the chessboard, lies and hypocrisy do not survive long
10. I have added these principles to the law: get the Knights into action before both Bishops are developed

Emanuel Lasker Image Quotes

The hardest game to win is a won game — Emanuel Lasker

Emanuel Lasker Short Quotes

• I have known many chess players, but among them there has been only one genius - Capablanca!
• In Chess, as it is played by masters, chance is practically eliminated.
• Without error, there is no brilliancy.
• I keep on fighting as long as my opponent can make a mistake.
• Chess is neither a science nor an art. It is what human nature most delights in--a fight.
• The attack is that process by means of which you remove obstructions.
• To find the right plan is just as hard as looking for its sound justification.
• Chess is, above all, a fight.

Emanuel Lasker Famous Quotes And Sayings

The hardest game to win is a won game — Emanuel Lasker

In mathematics, if I find a new approach to a problem, another mathematician might claim that he has a better, more elegant solution. In chess, if anybody claims he is better than I, I can checkmate him. — Emanuel Lasker

He who has a slight disadvantage plays more attentively, inventively and more boldly than his antagonist who either takes it easy or aspires after too much. Thus a slight disadvantage is very frequently seen to convert into a good, solid advantage. — Emanuel Lasker

By what right does White, in an absolutely even position, such as after move one, when both sides have advanced 1. e4, sacrifice a pawn, whose recapture is quite uncertain, and open up his kingside to attack? And then follow up this policy by leaving the check of the black queen open? None whatever! — Emanuel Lasker

The game gives us a satisfaction that Life denies us. And for the Chess player, the success which crowns his work, the great dispeller of sorrows, is named 'combination'. — Emanuel Lasker

Steinitz was a thinker worthy of a seat in the halls of a university. A player, as the world believed he was, he was not; his studious temperament made that impossible; and thus he was conquered by a player and in the end little valued by the world, he died. — Emanuel Lasker

To refer to the oft mooted question, "Which piece is stronger, the Bishop or the Knight?" it is clear that the value of the Bishop undergoes greater changes than that of the Knight. — Emanuel Lasker

By positional play a master tries to prove and exploit true values, whereas by combinations he seeks to refute false values ... A combination produces an unexpected re-assessment of values. — Emanuel Lasker

A chess game, after all, is a fight in which all possible factors must be made use of, and in which a knowledge of the opponent's good and bad qualities is of the greatest importance. — Emanuel Lasker

If Steinitz continually took pains to discover combinations, the success or failure of his diligent search could not be explained by him as due to chance. Hence, he concluded that some characteristic, a quality of the given position, must exist that would indicate the success or the failure of the search before it was actually undertaken. — Emanuel Lasker

Vanity should never tempt a player to engage in a combat at the risk of loss of health. It is bad enough to lose without the additional annoyance of paying doctors' bills. — Emanuel Lasker

Do not permit yourself to fall in love with the end-game play to the exclusion of entire games. It is well to have the whole story of how it happened; the complete play, not the denouement only. Do not embrace the rag-time and vaudeville of chess. — Emanuel Lasker

The process of making pieces in Chess do something useful (whatever it may be) has received a special name: it is called the attack. The attack is that process by means of which you remove obstructions. — Emanuel Lasker

The most intelligent inspection of any number of fine paintings will not make the observer a painter, nor will listening to a number of operas make the hearer a musician, but good judges of music and painting may so be formed. Chess differs from these. The intelligent perusal of fine games cannot fail to make the reader a better player and a better judge of the play of others. — Emanuel Lasker

Show me three variations in the leading handbook on the openings, and I will show you two of those three that are defective. — Emanuel Lasker

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. — Emanuel Lasker

The fatal hour of this ancient game is approaching. In its modern form this game will soon die a drawing death - the inevitable victory of certainty and mechanization will leave its stamp on the fate of chess. — Emanuel Lasker

Show me three lines of the opening theory moves and I will prove to you that two of them are incorrect. — Emanuel Lasker

An advantage could consist not only in a single important advantage but also in a multitude of insignificant advantages. — Emanuel Lasker

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 leas to standstill or to anarchy. — Emanuel Lasker

Of my fifty-seven years I have applied at least thirty to forgetting most of what I have learned or read. Since then, I have acquired a certain ease and cheer which I should never again like to be without. (...) I have stored little in my memory, but I can apply that little, and it is of use in many and varied emergencies. I keep it in order, but resist every attempt to increase its dead weight. — Emanuel Lasker

Loss generally occurs when a player overrates his advantage or for other reasons seeks to derive from a minute advantage a great return such as a forced win. — Emanuel Lasker

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. — Emanuel Lasker

Truth derives its strength not so much from itself as from the brilliant contrast it makes with what is only apparently true. This applies especially to Chess, where it is often found that the profoundest moves do not much startle the imagination. — Emanuel Lasker

The delight in gambits is a sign of chess youth... In very much the same way as the young man, on reaching his manhood years, lays aside the Indian stories and stories of adventure, and turns to the psychological novel, we with maturing experience leave off gambit playing and become interested in the less vivacious but withal more forceful manoeuvres of the position player. — Emanuel Lasker

The intelligent perusal of fine games cannot fail to make the reader a better player and a better judge of the play of others. — Emanuel Lasker

On a motif such as was indicated by Reti one cannot build the plan of a whole well contested game; it is too meagre, too thin, too puny for such an end. Reti's explanations, wherever they are concerned with an analysis which covers a few moves, are correct and praiseworthy. But when he abandons the foundations of analysis in order to draw too bold, too general a conclusion, his arguments prove to be mistaken. — Emanuel Lasker

The range of circumstances in which it is possible to presuppose the presence of a combination is very limited. The presence of such circumstances is the reason for the genesis of the idea in the master's brain. — Emanuel Lasker

When Alekhine recognizes the weakness in his position he has a tendency to become very aggressive. Patient defence is not for him if he can see the slightest chance of creating an attack. Yet sound strategy often demands that you submit to the opponent's will so as to strengthen your weaknesses and get rid of defects in your game. — Emanuel Lasker

I believe in magic ... There is magic in the creative faculty such as great poets and philosophers conspicuously possess, and equally in the creative chessmaster. — Emanuel Lasker

Life Lessons by Emanuel Lasker

1. Emanuel Lasker's approach to chess emphasizes the importance of understanding the underlying principles of the game, rather than relying on memorized moves and tactics.
2. He also believed in the importance of understanding the psychology of the game, and how to use that knowledge to gain an advantage over opponents.
3. Lasker's approach to chess teaches us to think strategically and to use our knowledge of the game to outwit our opponents.