The Immutable Longevity of Chess

David Shenk, author of The Immortal Game, enumerates games that have come and gone as a tribute to the eternal appeal of chess. Marriages have dissolved, jobs have been lost, and fist fights have erupted based on differences in the value of the the Royal Game.



I will list the games that have waxed and waned in popularity while chess continues to seize the imaginations and lives of people worldwide.

1. The Irish board game fidchell
2. The Egyptian game senet which is similar to backgammon
3. The Viking obsession hnefatafl where the object was for the King to escape
4. The Roman dice game duodecim scripta
5. The Greek petteia and kubeia

Again, Shenk's intent when he listed these games, in his highly stimulating tome, was to concretely prove there is something quite alluring and addictive about chess. His Prologue describes the infectious/viral character of a game that effectively paralyzed artist Marcel Duchamp to the extent that he dropped out of the art scene.

Duchamp's wife was so incensed over her spouse's obsession that she glued his pieces to the board and divorced him 3 months later! He would have been set for life as she was an heiress to a large fortune.