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Walter Tevis

Walter Tevis Quotes

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Famous Walter Tevis Quotes

“She had heard of the genetic code that could shape an eye or hand from passing proteins. Deoxyribonucleic acid. It contained the entire set of instructions for constructing a respiratory system and a digestive one, as well as the grip of an infant's hand. Chess was like that. The geometry of a position could be read and reread and not exhausted of possibility. You saw deeply into the layer of it, but there was another layer beyond that, and another, and another.”

ChessLayersDnaEndless PossibilitiesGenetic Code
Book:The Queen's Gambit
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“What I wanted to tell you about Philidor was that Diderot wrote him a letter. You know Diderot?" "The French Revolution?" "Yeah. Philidor was doing blindfold exhibitions and burning out his brain, or whatever it was they thought you did in the eighteenth century. Diderot wrote him: 'It is foolish to run the risk of going mad for vanity's sake.' I think of that sometimes when I'm analyzing my ass over a chessboard.”

ChessVanity18th CenturyDiderotGoing MadPhilidor
Book:The Queen's Gambit
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