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Combination is a soul of chess.

Alexander Alekhine

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Alexander Alekhine
Age: 53 †
Born: 1892
Born: October 10
Died: 1946
Died: March 24
Chess Player
Chess Theoretician
Jurist
Translator
Writer
Moscow
Russian SFSR
Alexander Alexandrovich Alekhine
Chess
Soul
Combination

More quotes by Alexander Alekhine

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Young players expose themselves to grave risks when they blindly imitate the innovations of masters without themselves first checking all the details and consequences of these innovations.
Alexander Alekhine
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I think that for the highest achievements nowadays... need to have the stable as a rock scientific base. And also need to own modesty.
Alexander Alekhine
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Playing for complications is an extreme measure that a player should adopt only when he cannot find a clear and logical plan.
Alexander Alekhine
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As a rule, so-called positional sacrifices are considered more difficult, and therefore more praise-worthy, than those which are based exclusively on an exact calculation of tactical possibilities.
Alexander Alekhine
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That which Steinitz gave to the theoretical aspect of the game when he was at his best is very remote to all out home-bred chess philosophers, but with his views on Morphy, whom he tries to discredit completely, it is of course impossible to agree.
Alexander Alekhine
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When asked, -How is that you pick better moves than your opponents?, I responded: I'm very glad you asked me that, because, as it happens, there is a very simple answer. I think up my own moves, and I make my opponent think up his
Alexander Alekhine
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The infallible criterion by which to distinguish the true from the would-be strategist is the degree of originality of his conceptions. It makes little difference whether this originality is carried to excess, as was the case with Steinitz and Nimzowitsch.
Alexander Alekhine
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You can become a big master in chess only if you see your mistakes and short-comings. Exactly the same as in life itself.
Alexander Alekhine
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Oh! this opponent, this collaborator against his will, whose notion of Beauty always differs from yours and whose means (strength, imagination, technique) are often too limited to help you effectively! What torment, to have your thinking and your phantasy tied down by another person!
Alexander Alekhine
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Chess is a matter of vanity.
Alexander Alekhine
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Deux fous gagnent toujours, mais trois fous, non!
Alexander Alekhine
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I have had to work long and hard to eradicate the dangerous delusion that, in a bad position, I could always, or nearly always, conjure up some unexpected combination to extricate me from my difficulties.
Alexander Alekhine
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Chess is not only knowledge and logic
Alexander Alekhine
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The purpose of human life and the sense of happiness is to give the maximum what the man is able to give.
Alexander Alekhine
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During a chess tournament a master must envisage himself as a cross between an ascetic monk and a beast of prey.
Alexander Alekhine
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The fact that a player is very short of time is to my mind, as little to be considered as an excuse as, for instance, the statement of the law-breaker that he was drunk at the time he committed the crime.
Alexander Alekhine
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The retreat of a minor piece to the back rank, where it cuts the lines of communication between the rooks, is permissable only in exceptional cases.
Alexander Alekhine
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In my opinion, a master is morally obliged to seize every sort of opportunity and to try to solve the problems of the position without fear of some simplifications.
Alexander Alekhine
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I study chess eight hours a day, on principle.
Alexander Alekhine
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A lifetime in not enough to learn everything about chess.
Alexander Alekhine