Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Life's too short for chess

Life's too short for chess. The chess pieces are the block alphabet which shapes thoughts; and these thoughts, although making a visual design on the chess-board, express their beauty abstractly, like a poem. … I have come to the personal conclusion that while all artists are not chess players, all chess players are artists. That was said by Marcel Duchamp (1887–1968), French artist.

The Arab traveler Al-Biruni rediscovered chess in Indus valley now in present day Pakistan. He is considered responsible for reintroducing ito the Islamic world, and thence to medieval Europe in tenth century. Archealogists have found artifacts resembling to chess pieces in the ruins of Moenjodaro in Indus valley. It Is believed that the ancient name of the game of chess was Chatrunga and It was played in Indus valley since 1000 BC or more. The centuries old story of "Sessa" the inventor of the game of chess goes some thing like this. Sessa traveled to Persia and presented his invented game to the King. He went to Persia because nobody appreciated his work in India. And Persia was famous those days for art, culture and education. The game was liked by the king so much that he asked Sessa to ask for recompense whatever he wished.

Sessa modestly requested to be given one grain of wheat for the first square of the chess board, two for the second, four for the third and so on doubling each time up to 64th square. Eventually the wise men of the king added the numbers 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 etc and found the sum of series to 64 terms or levels and concludeded that was not enough wheat in the kingdom to meet the demand of Sessa. Can you work out that sum?

"Life's too short for chess" is a quote attributed to Henry J. Byron.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

It was Byron who said Life's too short for chess.

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