"All this twaddle, the existence of God, atheism, determinism, liberation, societies, death, etc., are pieces of a chess game called language, and they are amusing only if one does not preoccupy oneself with 'winning or losing this game of chess.'"
— Marcel Duchamp

"Living together/ is one move closer/ to living apart"
— Kristi Maxwell

"When the Pawn Hits the Conflicts He Thinks Like a King What He Knows Throws the Blows When He Goes to the Fight and He'll Win the Whole Thing 'Fore He Enters the Ring There's No Body to Batter When Your Mind Is Your Might So When You Go Solo, You Hold Your Own Hand and Remember That Depth Is the Greatest of Heights and If You Know Where You Stand, Then You Know Where to Land and If You Fall It Won't Matter, Cuz You'll Know That You're Right"
— Fiona Apple

"“When you see a good move, look for a better one”"
— Emanuel Lasker

"Wouldn’t you rather play chess, Ma’am?....It’s less destructive of clothes.
— 'Rhett"
— Rowena Cherry (Knight's Fork)

""I failed to make the chess team because of my height.""
— Woody Allen

"The Pin is mightier than the sword"
— Fred Reinfeld

"....and a most curious country it was. There were a number of tiny little brooks running straight across it from side to side, and the ground between was divided up into squares by a number of little green hedges, that reached from brook to brook.
'I declare it's marked out just like a large chessboard!' Alice said at last. 'There ought to be some men moving about somewhere--and so there are!' she added in a tone of delight, and her heart began to beat quick with excitement as she went on. 'It's a great huge game of chess that's being played--all over the world--if this is the world at all, you know. Oh, what fun it is!'"
— Lewis Carroll (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland / Through the Looking-Glass)

"Wouldn’t you rather play chess, Ma’am?....It’s less destructive of clothes."
— Rhett, Knight’s Fork by Rowena Cherry

"What is a weak pawn? A pawn that is exposed to attack and also difficult to defend is a weak pawn. There are several varieties: isolated, doubled, too advanced, retarded."
— Samuel Reshevsky (Art of Positional Play)

"[Chess] is a foolish expedient for making idle people believe they are doing something very clever, when they are only wasting their time. "
— George Bernard Shaw (The Irrational Knot)

"He examined the chess problem and set out the pieces. It was a tricky ending, involving a couple of knights.
'White to play and mate in two moves.' Winston looked up at the portrait of Big Brother. White always mates,
he thought with a sort of cloudy mysticism. Always, without exception, it is so arranged. In no chess problem
since the beginning of the world has black ever won. Did it not symbolize the eternal, unvarying triumph of
Good over Evil? The huge face gazed back at him, full of calm power. White always mates."
— George Orwell (1984)

"I prefer to make my annotations 'hot on the heels', as it were, when the fortunes of battle, the worries, hopes and disappointments are still sufficiently fresh in my mind. Much as I would like to, I cannot say this about these few games which will be given below. In fact, if the annotator should begin to use phrases of the type: 'in reply to...I had worked out the following variation...', the reader will rightly say 'Grandmaster, you are showing off', since the 'oldest' of these games is now more than 25 years old, and even the 'newest' more than 20. Therefore, I would ask you not to regard the following 'stylised' annotations too severely. "
— Mikhail Tal (Life & Games of Mikhail Tal)

"How dreadful...to be caught up in a game and have no idea of the rules."
— Caroline Stevermer (Sorcery and Cecelia or The Enchanted Chocolate Pot: Being the Correspondence of Two Young Ladies of Quality Regarding Various Magical Scandals in London and the Country)

"....and a most curious country it was. There were a number of tiny little brooks running straight across it from side to side, and the ground between was divided up into squares by a number of little green hedges, that reached from brook to brook.
'I declare it's marked out just like a large chessboard!' Alice said at last. 'There ought to be some men moving about somewhere--and so there are!' she added in a tone of delight, and her heart began to beat quick with excitement as she went on. 'It's a great huge game of chess that being played--all over the world--if this is the world at all, you know. Oh, what fun it is!'"
— Lewis Carroll (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland / Through the Looking-Glass)