Monday, July 7, 2008

Ex Libris



The following bookplate belonged to Edward van Amerongen, the Dutch-Israeli chess player. The Hebrew is a quote from Zecharia 4:6, "Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit".

Quite a fitting quote for a chess player, especially in the original, where the word used for "spirit"--rua'h--also means "intellect" or "mind". We all feel like that if and when we win. Of course, when we lose, it's not because of the opponent's superior intellectual powers. Then, it's just a freak, momentary lapse from our usual-perfect play the opponent was lucky to exploit.

Photo credit: www.chessgraphics.net. They, in turn, credit it to Jean Buchet, writing in L'Echiquier de Paris in a series of articles from 1947 to 1953.

No comments:

Post a Comment