6/17/2021 – How many different games of chess are possible? Everyone knows it's a very, very large number. It can be written down in seconds, using just a few digits, is unimaginably huge. Unimaginable? The great scientist Enrico Fermi recommended that we at least try to understand very large numbers, to estimate what they entail. Mathematics professor Christian Hesse attempts to do this for the number of chess games. You will be stunned!

5/21/2021 – It was a two-part task: from the reactions of students to a Zen master's whispered hints, they try to deduce which piece he is thinking of. In the second part you have to solve a chess study with a uniquely different drawing strategy. Very strong players all over the world joined in our experiment – most failed to solve the Logical. Here at last are the solutions – both of them.

5/5/2021 – Two students are studying a chess position. A Zen master watches and tells them that one of the pieces will play a very deep move. "Which one?" the students want to know. The Zen master whispers the piece type to one student and the colour to the other. From their reactions they are able to deduce which piece it is. You can help us in a book project by solving the problem. And hopefully have some fun in the process.

11/28/2020 – Emanuel Lasker, the second official World Chess Champion, used to play Bridge with his brother Berthold in coffee houses in Berlin at the end of the 19th century. He was also interested in Lasca, Go, Pokerette and Whistette — but, luckily for chess enthusiasts, he ended up dedicating his life to the royal game. Columnist Siegfried Hornecker presents the German’s endgame studies, plus a controversy surrounding an adjourned game which could have led to Lasker giving up on chess.

8/31/2020 – In 1949, four years after the end of World War II, the Allies divided Germany into West Germany (the Federal Republic of Germany, FRG) and East Germany (the German Democratic Republic, GDR). For chess composers, the main restriction was that they were unable to travel into western countries and the fact that they could not always send chess compositions to western sources, nor receive them. Columnist Siegfried Hornecker tells us how the chess composition scene was kept alive in the GDR. | Pictured: Leipzig in the 1980s

8/23/2020 – In a recent article mathematician Christian Hesse described the concept of the "winchain" – is there a player you have beaten, who has beaten someone, who has beaten someone, who beat a World Champion? It is astonishing how close you can get – like a 2144 player, Fabian Brinkmann, being just three steps away from Magnus Carlsen. Fabian has written a nice little ChessBase app which will help you search for your winchains.

8/13/2020 – How far away are you from the World Champion, in terms of handshakes, we asked our readers? At least one traced his handshake route all the way back to Philidor. Now we have a new challenge: have you beaten someone who has beaten someone who has beaten a World Champion? Prof. Christian Hesse describes the idea. You are invited to participate.

5/3/2020 – So I am being pressured to publish a book, a collection of articles that have, in the last twenty years, appeared on our news page – especially those describing encounters with famous players. And the ones that showed entertaining puzzles and games. They were very nice on a computer monitor, where you can replay and analyse everything – but transfering them onto very thin slices of tree? Nobody fetches a chessboard and pieces to replay moves anymore. Ahh, but there's a solution to this problem. Let me show you. And please help me evaluate this approach.

4/30/2020 – People are urging me to write a book (or books) with stories about my encounters with famous players. And with puzzles and chess pleasantries. Most of the material has appeared on our news page, but the articles have descended into the obscurities of the archives. So people want a collection in printed form, to read in the garden, in bed, on trains. But what about the chess games and moves? Who is going to set up a board to replay them? Ahh, but perhaps there is a solution, a way to make printed games easily replayable. Curious? Here's what that would (will) look like.

7/8/2019 – This is one of the most elegant chess problems we have ever seen. It was composed by the master, Pal Benko when he was just fifteen. Five pieces, four on their original squares, and the task is to force mate in three moves. That is quite difficult: Bobby Fischer failed to find the solution in half an hour. Can you do better – and can you find a correction for the minor dual that was found in the problem? You can win a nice prize if you do.

4/28/2018 – Chess is a wide field with many interconnections, and while preparing this month’s article about pawn endgame composer Nikolay Grigoriev, study expert and historian SIEGFRIED HORNECKER learned about a nearly forgotten chess organizer from the early Soviet Union, Valerian Eremeev. But also Alekhine’s five queen game might have influenced Grigoriev.

3/11/2018 – He faced the process of writing as a "literary chess problem", and considered the composition of chess problems to be comparable to poetry. Vladimir Nabokov was one of the most celebrated creators of bridges between art and chess. | Pictured: Nabokov in 1973 | Photo: Walter Mori

7/21/2017 – After three games in the Match of the Century the score was 2:1 for the reigning World Champion. In game four Spassky played a well-prepared Sicilian and obtained a raging attack. Fischer defended tenaciously and the game was drawn. Then came a key game, about which the 1972 US Champion and New York Times and Chess Life correspondent GM Robert Byrne filed reports. In Reykjavik chess fan Lawrence Stevens from California did something extraordinary: he manually recorded the times both players had spent on each move.

7/16/2017 – The challenger, tormented by the cameras installed in the playing hall, traumatically lost the first game of his match against World Champion Boris Spassky. He continued his vigorous protest, and when his demands were not met Fischer did not turn up for game two. He was forfeited and the score was 0-2. Bobby booked a flight back to New York, but practically at the very last moment decided to play game three – in an isolated ping-pong room!

7/9/2017 – The legendary Match of the Century between Boris Spassky and Bobby Fischer was staged in the Laugardalshöllin in Reykjavik. This is Iceland’s largest sporting arena, seating 5,500, but also the site for concerts – Led Zeppelin, Leonard Cohen and David Bowie all played there. 45 years after the Spassky-Fischer spectacle Frederic Friedel visited Laugardalshöllin and discovered some treasures there.

7/4/2017 – In the final week of June 1972 the chess world was in turmoil. The match between World Champion Boris Spassky and his challenger Bobby Fischer was scheduled to begin, in the Icelandic capital of Reykjavik, on July 1st. But there was no sign of Fischer. The opening ceremony took place without him, and the first game, scheduled for July 2nd, was postponed. Then finally, in the early hours of July 4th, Fischer arrived. Frederic Friedel narrates.

2/5/2016 – Averbakh called them "threats of the 1st degree" – moves which directly and bluntly threaten to bring about a concrete mate or the win of material. 2nd degree threats are moves which are intended to enable threats of the 1st degree. And so it continues, recursively. In his wonderfully entertaining book Joys of Chess Prof. Christian Hesse goes all the way to threats of the 5th degree.

3/30/2015 – In order to be victorious in a game of chess, generally speaking an element of offensive ‘up-and-at-’em’ is required. But in exceptional situations the strongest move by far can be a simple retreat. Good, unforced retreats by well-placed pieces are amongst the hardest manœuvres to find, and they are rare. In his book Joys of Chess Christian Hesse shows us some astounding examples.

10/23/2014 – "Chess problems demand from the composer the same virtues that characterize all worthwhile art," said Vladimir Nabokov, one of the greatest novelists of our time. He was also an avid chess player and composer of chess problems. One of his novels, Luzhin’s Defence, became a popular movie. Prof. Christian Hesse tells us the story of the greatest chess lover among writers, and vice versa.

5/19/2014 – There are many basic motifs in chess, such as the knight fork of king and queen, the bishop sacrifice on h7, the back-rank mate, the pin. They are well known and may be found more or less obviously on the surface, thus standing out from the position. Or they may lie as yet undiscovered at some archæological level. Prof. Christian Hesse uncovers some entertaining examples.

4/28/2014 – Parallels between life and chess are frequently drawn, evoking thoughts, emotions and notions like Love, Depth, Universe, Infinity, Passion, Perseverance, Patience, Blunder, Victory, Beauty, Silence, Simplicity, Indecision, Dark and Light. A chess player and artist, Diana Mihjalova, has translated them into a pictorial language, using acrylic on canvas, and put the concepts into historical perspective.

2/22/2014 – The Darwin Awards "honour" people who have improved the human gene pool by removing themselves from it by an involuntary death in a particularly grotesque manner. In chess, where danger is always lurking, there are some remarkable examples of Freud's thanatos (death) drive in action. They are uncovered by Professor Christian Hesse in his very enjoyable book: Joys of Chess.

2/5/2014 – Every chess player probably has his favourite game: Byrne-Fischer from the Rosenwald Tournament 1956, Kasparov-Topalov, in Wijk aan Zee 1999, or for chess romantics the Immortal Game Anderssen-Kieseritzky from 1851. In his book The Joys of Chess Professor Christian Hesse has selected a lesser know game, but one dominated by a series of incredible sacrifices. Let him show us this game.

12/13/2013 – Did you know that until the 17th century castling in chess was two separate moves? Or that today there is a chess magazine devoted entirely to castling? Professor Christian Hesse has devoted a section of his book The Joys of Chess to spectacular instances of castling, including rare positions in which the castling move deserves two or even three exclamation marks.