Arthur Smith

“ A game is so much the more interesting the oftener the opportunities for victory or defeat change, and in Chess these chances do not change often, seldom more than twice. In Go, on the other hand, they change much more frequently, and sometimes just at the end of the game, perhaps in the last moments, an almost certain defeat may by some clever move be changed into a victory. ”

“ Also to a beginner the play, especially in the beginning of the game, seems vague; there are so many points on which the stones may be played, and the amount of territory obtainable by one move or the other seems hopelessly indefinite. This objection is more apparent than real, and as one’s knowledge of the game grows, it becomes apparent that the first stones must be played with great care, and that there are certain definite, advantageous positions, which limit the player in his choice of moves, just as the recognized Chess openings guide our play in that game. ”

“ Most of the higher officials of the government, and also the officers in the army and navy, are skilled players. The great daily newspapers of the capitals have a Go department, just as some of our periodicals have a department devoted to Chess, and the game is very much played at the hot springs and health resorts, and clubs, and teachers of the art are found in all of the larger cities. Go has always retained something of its early aristocratic character, and in fact, it is still regarded as necessary for a man of refinement to possess a certain skill at the game. ”

“ Honinbo Sansha, who was still the best Go player in Japan, was named as the head of the institution. The other most skilful masters were installed as professors with good salaries. To Honinbo Sansha, the director, was given 350 tsubo of land (a tsubo is as big as two Japanese mats or tatami, and is therefore six feet square) , and an annual revenue of 200 koku of rice (a koku is a little more than five bushels) . Men of the best intelligence could now dedicate themselves to the education of students and the further development of the game, freed from the cares of earning a livelihood. ”

“ Players of high rank who are challenged by the improving players of the lower grades will instinctively desire to make it more difficult for the new players to attain the higher degree, because their own fame, which is their highest possession, depends upon the result of the game; and assuming that all trial games could be conducted in an impartial and judicial spirit, nevertheless, all the players would become more expert from the hard practice, even if their skill in relation to each other remained the same. ”

“ That the Japanese could find pleasure in merely watching a game that is so abstract in its nature and so difficult to understand is evidence of the fact that they were then a highly cultivated people intellectually. We find nothing like it in this country except in the narrowest Chess circles.
In the beginning of the seventeenth century Go attained such a high development that there appeared a series of expert players who far surpassed anything known before. Of these the most famous were Honinbo Sansha Hoin, Nakamura Doseki, Hayashi Rigen, Inouye Inseki, and Yasui Santetsu. ”

“ The Japanese always take the stone between the middle and index fingers, and not between the thumb and index finger as we are likely to do, and they place it on the board smartly and with great skill, so that it gives a cheerful sound, as before stated.
For use in this country the board need not be so thick, and need not, of course, have feet, but if it is attempted to play the game on cardboard, which has a dead sound as the stones are played, it is surprising how much the pleasure of the game is diminished. ”

“ As a rule it may be said that two average players of about equal strength will find more pleasure in Go than in Chess, for in Chess it is almost certain that the first of two such players who loses a piece will lose the game, and further play is mostly an unsuccessful struggle against certain defeat. In Go, on the other hand, a severe loss does not by any means entail the loss of the game, for the player temporarily worsted can betake himself to another portion of the field where, for the most part unaffected by the reverse already suffered, he may gain a compensating advantage. ”

“ It arises where a group is apparently engulfed by the opponent, and when, by adding further stones to it which the opponent must take, the threatened player can force his opponent to abandon a part of his surrounding chain in order not to sustain greater losses. The attack is so sudden and unexpected that the Japanese compare it to the methods of a highwayman. It is an example of the finest play in the game. ”

“ When handicaps are given in Chess, the whole opening is more or less spoiled, and the scale of handicaps, from the Bishop’s Pawn to Queen’s Rook, is not very accurate; and in one variation of the Muzio gambit, so far from being a handicap, it is really an advantage to the first player to give up the Queen’s Knight. In Go, on the other hand, the handicaps are in a progressive scale of great accuracy, they have been given from the earliest times, and the openings with handicaps have been studied quite as much as those without handicaps. ”

“ In order to understand the rule or principle of the two “Me,” we must first look at the situation shown in Plate 3, Diagram I. There, if a black stone is played at F 15, although it is played on an intersection entirely surrounded by white stones, it nevertheless lives because the moment it is played it has the effect of killing the entire white group; that is to say, a stone may be played on an intersection where it is completely surrounded if as it is played it has the effect of completely surrounding the adversary’s stones already on the board. ”

“ In other games such a graduated system of classifying players would be scarcely possible, but among good Go players it is feasible, because the better player almost invariably wins, even if he be but slightly superior. If the difference in skill could not be equalized in some way the game would become tiresome, as the weaker player would almost always be able to foresee his defeat. The stronger player, therefore, allows his adversary to place enough stones on the board as a handicap to make the adversaries approximately equal. ”

“ It has, however, been shown by Honinbo Dosaku that this move gives the first player no decisive advantage, and I have been also told by some Japanese that the reason that this move is regarded as impolite is because it is a wasted move, and implies a disrespect for the adversary’s skill, and from what experience I have had in the game I think the latter explanation is more plausible. At all events, such a move is most unusual and can only be utilized by a player of the highest skill. ”

“ When we think that it would take twenty-seven years to play ten thousand games at the rate of one game per day, we can get some idea of the Japanese estimate of its difficulty. The difficulty of the game and the remarkable amount of time and labor which it is necessary to expend in order to become even a moderately good player, are the reasons why Go has not spread to other countries since Japan has been opened to foreign intercourse. ”

“ It is something like perpetual check in Chess, but the Japanese, in place of calling the game a draw, compel the second player to move elsewhere and thus allow the game to continue. In an actual game when a player is prevented from retaking a stone by the rule of "Ko," he always tries to play in some other portion of the board where he threatens a larger group of stones than is involved in the situation where "Ko" occurs, and thus often he can compel his adversary to follow him to this other part of the field, and then return to retake in "Ko." ”

“ It is difficult for the beginner at first to understand why the filling of these “Dame” results in no advantage to either player, and beginners often fill up such spaces even before the end of the game, feeling that they are gaining ground slowly but surely; and the Japanese have a saying, “Heta go ni dame nashi,” which means that there are no “Dame” in beginners’ Go, as beginners do not recognize their uselessness. ”

“ Passing from these words which describe the commonest moves in the game, we will mention the expression "Te okure"—literally "a slow hand" or "a slow move," which means an unnecessary or wasted move. Many of the moves of a beginner are of this character, especially when he has a territory pretty well fenced in and cannot make up his mind whether or not it is necessary to strengthen the group before proceeding to another field of battle. ”

“ After Black’s twenty-ninth move at N 17, No. 4 could still escape by means of P 15, but giving it up brings more territory elsewhere than is there lost. It is a favorite device of strong players to apparently abandon a position to their adversary after first preparing it so that eventually it may live, or so that it may afterward aid in surrounding one of the adversary’s groups. The abandoned position often reawakens to life if the weaker adversary allows his surrounding group to be itself surrounded and taken before the capture of the abandoned position has been completed. ”

“ The game of Go belongs to the class of games of which our Chess, though very dissimilar, is an example. It is played on a board, and is a game of pure skill, into which the element of chance does not enter; moreover, it is an exceedingly difficult game to learn, and no one can expect to acquire the most superficial knowledge of it without many hours of hard work. It is said in Japan that a player with ordinary aptitude for the game would have to play ten thousand games in order to attain professional rank of the lowest degree. ”

“ But let us suppose that a black group at the end of the game is found to be hopeless and also completely surrounded with the exception of one point. The question arises, can the Black player demand that his adversary play on the vacant space in order to kill this group, for, if he could, it is obvious he would gain one “Me” by so doing. The answer is, he cannot so demand, and his adversary is not bound to play on this point, and the hopeless or abandoned stones are removed without further play. ”

“ It is not so easy to see that the black stones at L and M 18, N, O, P, Q and R 17, N 16, and M and N 15 are dead, but against a good player they would have no hope of forming the necessary two "Me," and they are therefore conceded to be dead; but a good player could probably manage to defend them against a novice. It is still more difficult to see why the irregular white group of eighteen stones on the left-hand side of the board has been abandoned, but there also White has no chance of making the necessary two "Me." ”

“ Next to the corners of the board the sides of the board are easiest to defend, and territory is more easily formed along the sides than in the center, and in an ordinary game the play generally proceeds from the corners and edges to the center. The importance which the Japanese attach to the corners is shown by their saying "Yo sumi torarete go wo utsu na," or, "if the four corners are taken, cease playing." Against a good player it is next to impossible to form territory in the center of the board, unless it is based on one of the sides or corners. ”

“ Necessarily the collection here given is a very small one, but if any reader of this book becomes so much interested in the game that he desires to study other examples, he will doubtless find some Japanese acquaintance who can supply him with further material, as the Japanese literature of the game contains large collections.
The most important kind of problems are those in which the question is how to kill an adversary's group, or how to save one's own group when threatened. It is also often very important to know how a connection between two groups can be forced. ”

“ Honinbo Sansha established at the time of the foundation of the Academy a method of classifying the players by giving them degrees, which still exists, although no longer under the authority of the State. When a man attained to a certain measure of skill in the game he received the title "Shodan," or, of the first degree. ”

“ It is advantageous for the losing player to abandon such a group as soon as possible, for, if he continues to add to the group, he loses not only the territory but the added stones also. If the circumstances are such that his opponent has to reply to his moves in the hopeless territory, the loss is not so great, as the opponent is meanwhile filling up spaces which would otherwise be vacant, and against an inferior player there is a chance of the adversary making a slip and allowing the threatened stones to save themselves. ”

“ While in Japan Go has attained such a high development, largely through the help of the government, as has been shown, it seems to be decadent in its motherland of China. The Japanese players assure us that there is no player in China equal to a Japanese player of the first degree. In Korea also the game is played, but the skill there attained is also immensely below the Japanese standard. ”