The article begins:
One day a number of years ago, I was deep into a game of draughts on holiday with my daughter, then almost four, in the small library of a beachfront town. Her eye drifted to a nearby table, where a black-and-white board bristled with far more interesting figures (many a future chess master has been innocently drawn in by “horses” and “castles”).
“What’s that?” she asked. “Chess,” I replied. “Can we play?” she pleaded. I nodded absently.
There was just one problem: I didn’t know how. I dimly remembered having learned the basic moves as a kid, but chess had never stuck. This fact vaguely haunted me through my life. I would see an idle board in a hotel lobby or a puzzle in a weekend newspaper supplement, and feel a pang.
I had picked up a general awareness of chess. I knew the names Bobby Fischer and Garry Kasparov. I knew that the game had enchanted historical luminaries including Marcel Duchamp and Vladimir Nabokov. I knew the cliche about grandmasters being able to look a dozen moves ahead. I knew that chess, like classical music, was shorthand in movies for genius – often of the evil variety. But I knew chess the way I “knew” the Japanese language: what it looks like, what it sounds like, its Japaneseness, without actually comprehending it.
I decided to learn the game, if only to be able to teach my daughter.
It took a few hours, hunched over my smartphone at kids’ birthday parties or waiting in line at Trader Joe’s, to get a feel for the basic moves
This is very dfferent to the same writer's piece in
Nautilus and
The Week five years ago which began thus:
My 4-year-old daughter and I were deep in a game of checkers one day about three years ago when her eye drifted to a nearby table. There, a black-and-white board bristled with far more interesting figures, like horses and castles. "What's that?" she asked. "Chess," I replied. "Can we play?" she asked. I nodded absently.
There was just one problem: I didn't know how. I dimly remembered having learned the basic moves in elementary school, but it never stuck. This fact vaguely haunted me through my life; idle chessboards in hotel lobbies or puzzles in weekend newspaper supplements teased me like reproachful riddles.
And so I decided I would learn, if only so I could teach my daughter. The basic moves were easy enough to pick up — a few hours hunched over my smartphone at kids' birthday parties or waiting in line at the grocery store.
