Spoilers ahead! Yar!
Those of us with eccentric or arcane hobbies are used to the neglect from mainstream media and publicity. I think Go, as least for Westerners, falls nicely under the category “Arcane Hobby” and it shows. There are few references to Go in sitcoms, no televised events, and only paltry mention of the game in newspapers, and usually only then when Go is somehow involved in charity or child development.
There are, however, a few odd and glittering moments when an entertainment venue taps Go as a vehicle for art. Though it wasn’t the brainchild of a Western director (we will have to wait sometime for that) Zhuangzhuang Tian’s film Go Master relies heavily on Go as a leitmotif to tell the compelling and conflicted story of a Go wunderkind named Wu Qingyuan. In order to foster his prodigious aptitude for Go, a young Qingyuan travels from his native China to Japan where his skill earns him a respected position in the competitive Go community. But while he may have found success on the Go board, Qingyuan finds life far from home increasingly difficult. The strain of living in a foreign land accrues on his fragile but apt mind, and the gradually worsening relations between 1930’s Japan and China leave him caught between two cultures and two homes. When war breaks out Qingyuan is torn from his homeland, his heritage and even his precious game of Go. In a wandering journey of self-reflection he approaches the issues of identity, love and faith and is once again caught in a turmoil that rivals the greatest challenge on the Go board.
It is a compelling story. The history of relations between Japan and China reads like a good mystery novel, though far more macabre and serious. But what a Western audience lacks, besides an interest in East Asian history, is a micro-history to sympathize with. How can we ever attune to the prevailing attitudes of two intimately related countries that seem very distant and very far, without a human face? Qingyuan is merely a human figure for a much larger and more poignant dialogue, and one we can translate into our own experience. But Sino-Japanese relations and their cinema personifications are a field of study all their own. What I appreciate most about Wu Qingyuan is its story telling props and it goes without saying that those are embodied in the game of Go. Qingyuan is, after all, the titular “Go Master”. But where does Go fit into the major themes of the film?
Go is ancillary. It is not the central plot. If you want that, watch Hikaru no Go. In The Go Master, Go is an extended metaphor, if veiled and implicit, for Qingyuan’s inner struggle. At first he rationalizes, ponders and meditates his way through Japan’s xenophobia and his own clamoring for a Chinese identity. Only when these fail does he rely on blind faith. And even a beginner can recognize that blind faith is a poor tactic in Go, and so it is in Qingyuan’s life as well.
The scenes with players playing Go are incredibly well filmed, almost to the point of elegance. A mix of serene Japanese interiors and verdant gardens in the background with detailed symmetry between rival players captures the dramatic quality of Go. The director captures the historically correct low-light with a strong grasp of color, giving an unexpected quality of vibrancy and liveliness to what is, by all means, a very quiet and demure game. And though these shots of Go are intermittent, they establish the entire stylistic approach to the film. Zhuangzhuang’s efforts are a generous panegyric to the subtle beauty of Go, and practically everything else in the shot – the tatami, the player’s raiment, the shoji, even the eerie silence that accompanies the obligatory moment of thought.
The last time a movie was made on a hobby of mine it was the Dungeons & Dragons film. Truly, that movie was a desolate waste hole of budgeting. Even the Lord of Thieves, an concept so cool it’s impossible to mess up, was given a pugilistic beating with the stick of ineptitude. To have a film that does beautiful justice to a game it incorporates, then, is quite the benison. The Go Master received accolades at a local Asian Film Festival, but beyond a cursory review here and there and a small fan base of loyalist watchers, I doubt it has made much of an impact here. The cultural translation required is minimal, only being a hair more foreign than Letters From Iwo Jima, so it could be done. Still, do yourself a favor and find a vendor or a friend who has a copy of this movie and watch it. It’s nice to bring a little color back to a game whose roots have indelible aesthetic qualities that can be leeched after so much time relegated to LCD screens and low color visuals.
Friday, October 5, 2007
Thursday, September 6, 2007
The Jeep Crashed Into The Wall
To follow up on the previous post discussing beginner's intuition and why it's detrimental to always hermetically seal off your territory, here's another example where locking in that last stone for a clear-cut block of territory will ultimately end up losing it for the player.
Diagram 1
Let's assume it is black's turn. His perogative is to defend the corner territory and settle it in his favor. That means giving the group life, but it must be done cautiously. They may first be tempted to put a stone at D1. This would presumably keep White from invading. By all appearances black has barred all the entrances. How could white possibly invade such a small space? Easy. Go is not a game of strict terra firma movement. Stones can "parachute" in behind enemy lines where appropriate. This is common when a player tries to cordon off too much territory. Their opponent will simply slip a stone somewhere behind the bulwark of stones and start making a living shape. But this is a bit different. It's a much smaller space, encompassing a mere five grid points. So how could white invade to cripple black's group?
When plack plays at D1 he's made a terrible formation. At least, terrible for him. Put a stone at D1 and suddenly the territory is a "Bulky 5" or "The Jeep". And like many other common groups of four, five, or six spaces, there's a "critical" point that can make or break the whole group. In a bulky five it is in the middle of the three space row or, to continue the analogy, under the chassis of the jeep between axels. In this case it is B1. Now that black has formed the Bulky 5 with D1, white can go ahead and play the critical point. Once has done so there is no way for white to recooperate. The group is dead.
If, instead of playing at D1 white had played at B1 first he has secured life for the group, though it may not look like it. If white next attacks at D1, black smirks and replies at C1. The two eyes are in place. One is at A1 and the other is a two point eye space - B2 and C2. If white takes a conservative tack and approaches at E1 then black responds at D1 and, again, two eyes appear.
Playing the Bulky 5's critical point requires the beginner to use some foresight.
When plack plays at D1 he's made a terrible formation. At least, terrible for him. Put a stone at D1 and suddenly the territory is a "Bulky 5" or "The Jeep". And like many other common groups of four, five, or six spaces, there's a "critical" point that can make or break the whole group. In a bulky five it is in the middle of the three space row or, to continue the analogy, under the chassis of the jeep between axels. In this case it is B1. Now that black has formed the Bulky 5 with D1, white can go ahead and play the critical point. Once has done so there is no way for white to recooperate. The group is dead.
If, instead of playing at D1 white had played at B1 first he has secured life for the group, though it may not look like it. If white next attacks at D1, black smirks and replies at C1. The two eyes are in place. One is at A1 and the other is a two point eye space - B2 and C2. If white takes a conservative tack and approaches at E1 then black responds at D1 and, again, two eyes appear.
Playing the Bulky 5's critical point requires the beginner to use some foresight.
To many newbies the above problem does not look like the Bulky 5 unti a stone is played at D1. However, a player should begin to recognize instances where a formation or space is an embryonic form of the Bulky 5, thereby avoiding an egregious mistake like black's initial defense at D1. It's only a one stone play, but making life requires the predictive power to see that one stone, and the knowledge to assess the Bulky 5 as a very dangerous group if left to the opponent to strike at it's vital point.
Monday, September 3, 2007
The Great Wall That Wasn't A Wall
Taken from Graded Go Problems for Beginners Vol. 1
I'm going to be honest. The first book in the "Graded Go Problems" series is ever so slightly too easy. Most of the problems give the reader an extraordinarily facile challenge. The answers are so brutally obvious it's hard to see how anybody could miss. There are exceptions, of course, but the greater fraction of the many, many problems let you either kill yourself and disgrace your family name OR make life and crush your opponent, vandalizing his entire career record and then you, the valiant and honored hero gets whisked away on a sea of admirer's arms. What I have here is a sampling of those problems that bring up interesting questions. CAVEAT: The so-called interesting questions are interesting so far as my troglodyte understanding of the game permits. This will be maddeningly boring to anybody with a larger brain mass than say, a canary.
The first diagram here is the most lucidly clear example of the a phenomena that occurred repeatedly through the text. Note - Stone configuration is changed a bit to keep any chance of copyright infringement at bay.
Speaking on my own behalf, which is convenient since I am the one typing, this kind of problem is deceptively easy. You are white. The opponent is black. He is trying to sneak his way behind the lines to kill your group. You are resisting his efforts, desperately mortaring stones together to make a wall of Babylonian proportions. Your first, tyro instinct is to complete one side of the fortification at either M1 or Q1 thereby cutting off black's invidious advance. Let us say you do at Q1. This permits Black to encroach at M1 (or vice-versa if the white stone goes to M1). Once he's made that attack you can block again at N1, forcing Black to reinforce himself at L1. Now you have a 3 space grouping that can form two eyes once a stone is placed at O1 and you've made all of two territory points. Congratulations. You're new territory will forever be known as "The Most Cramped Place in the World - Yes, Even More Cramped Than Tokyo". If, at the beginning you placed your first protective stone at R1 instead of Q1 you'd still need to place at Q1 to keep black from breaking through.
Let's restart. We must now defy instinct. All those games of Warcraft II where you built walls from edge to edge to keep out the fulsomely cheap Orcs are at an end. This is Go, and the essence of Go is finesse. Not moisture. We must find a place where any kind of encroachment is futile. We want black to either waste his time invading or, at the very least, leave him in a place where he realizes it is futile and plays elsewhere. Where's that spot?
O1. Now you've made two eyes. Well, almost. If black attacks at M1 or Q1 (P1 and N1 result in immediate capture now that O1 white is in play) white forms eye #2 at the spot left unoccupied. So, if black attacks at M1, white makes two eyes at Q1. Is this advantageous?
In the first example we used two stones to secure 2 spaces. In the second example we ultimately use two stones to secure 2 spaces. Perhaps it is not so good after all...
EDIT: As the kind commenter pointed out, black can also just do away with white by playing at the coveted O1 spot first. This nullifies that precious eye making point that is critical to both approaches. The above examples were to show that a beginner vs. beginner periphery fight would be stylistically and pragmatically inferior to the simple "whoever plays O1 takes all".
Let's look at Diagram 2.
The roles are reversed. Black is fending off white, who is slowly snaking his way around black's hind flanks. It's time for rear guard action. This is somewhat similiar to Diagram 1, except things are a bit more precarious. Black is on the precipice of death, and any foul-up will result in a huge win for white. So, let's take the first solution from the first example and apply it here. That means we wall off the open sides and hope white doesn't leak in. Does it work?
A black stone at M1 does indeed keep white from moving any further in on that particular side. The left side is a bit different. Now that black has moved his reinforcements into M1, white takes the opportunity to stroll into K1. Black is forced to counter at L1, but alas, this ends in a false eye and black is vanquished. There is now a Ko and a lot of black stones in line for the guillotine. What if black defends first at K1? White now takes M1, forcing black to defend at L1. White reinforces his invasion at O1 to keep black from taking two prisoners. But now black looks at his configuration, and it is grim indeed. The triad of stones at K2, K1 and L1 compose a false eye. The group is dead, and woe unto black, for his efforts are undone!
Now, let's say black puts down a stone on L1 from the very start. He is attempting a defense well away from his walls, leaving big open spaces for rapacious conquerors. It looks bad and feels bad, and the neophyte will get queasy, but not once they see they've made life. White can approach at K1, but white secures two eyes by simply placing a stone at M1. Alternately, white attacks at M1, but suddenly he's short liberties, has self-atari'd and black picks up two stones. All because black played away from the walls.
ANOTHER EDIT: Again, kudos to the commenter. In this case, white attacking at K1 DOES NOT lead to a ko unless white perpetually assaults black at L2 to keep the ko alive. Indeed, the smarter move here is to simply reinforce white's position with a stone at J1. Furthermore, if black did make the smart move and play at L1, white cannot approach at K1 for fear of black immediately capturing it with J1. Thanks again for the help!
My purpose here is to teach the beginner how to break away from the wall mindset when the situation demands it. Lots of beginner books stress that Go is a game about territory. They are right. They also stress that you need to mark and protect territory. They are right. But sometimes you have to play "in" to protect your territory from your opponent. It is not intuitive. The first reflex is to wall off that section of the board for good, but as evidenced by the situation in Diagram 2 it is not always the wisest choice.
This, I think, is the most interesting lesson culled from "Graded Go Problems for Beginners Vol. 1", at least for the uninitiated.
I'm going to be honest. The first book in the "Graded Go Problems" series is ever so slightly too easy. Most of the problems give the reader an extraordinarily facile challenge. The answers are so brutally obvious it's hard to see how anybody could miss. There are exceptions, of course, but the greater fraction of the many, many problems let you either kill yourself and disgrace your family name OR make life and crush your opponent, vandalizing his entire career record and then you, the valiant and honored hero gets whisked away on a sea of admirer's arms. What I have here is a sampling of those problems that bring up interesting questions. CAVEAT: The so-called interesting questions are interesting so far as my troglodyte understanding of the game permits. This will be maddeningly boring to anybody with a larger brain mass than say, a canary.
The first diagram here is the most lucidly clear example of the a phenomena that occurred repeatedly through the text. Note - Stone configuration is changed a bit to keep any chance of copyright infringement at bay.
Diagram 1
Speaking on my own behalf, which is convenient since I am the one typing, this kind of problem is deceptively easy. You are white. The opponent is black. He is trying to sneak his way behind the lines to kill your group. You are resisting his efforts, desperately mortaring stones together to make a wall of Babylonian proportions. Your first, tyro instinct is to complete one side of the fortification at either M1 or Q1 thereby cutting off black's invidious advance. Let us say you do at Q1. This permits Black to encroach at M1 (or vice-versa if the white stone goes to M1). Once he's made that attack you can block again at N1, forcing Black to reinforce himself at L1. Now you have a 3 space grouping that can form two eyes once a stone is placed at O1 and you've made all of two territory points. Congratulations. You're new territory will forever be known as "The Most Cramped Place in the World - Yes, Even More Cramped Than Tokyo". If, at the beginning you placed your first protective stone at R1 instead of Q1 you'd still need to place at Q1 to keep black from breaking through.
Let's restart. We must now defy instinct. All those games of Warcraft II where you built walls from edge to edge to keep out the fulsomely cheap Orcs are at an end. This is Go, and the essence of Go is finesse. Not moisture. We must find a place where any kind of encroachment is futile. We want black to either waste his time invading or, at the very least, leave him in a place where he realizes it is futile and plays elsewhere. Where's that spot?
O1. Now you've made two eyes. Well, almost. If black attacks at M1 or Q1 (P1 and N1 result in immediate capture now that O1 white is in play) white forms eye #2 at the spot left unoccupied. So, if black attacks at M1, white makes two eyes at Q1. Is this advantageous?
In the first example we used two stones to secure 2 spaces. In the second example we ultimately use two stones to secure 2 spaces. Perhaps it is not so good after all...
EDIT: As the kind commenter pointed out, black can also just do away with white by playing at the coveted O1 spot first. This nullifies that precious eye making point that is critical to both approaches. The above examples were to show that a beginner vs. beginner periphery fight would be stylistically and pragmatically inferior to the simple "whoever plays O1 takes all".
Let's look at Diagram 2.
Diagram 2
The roles are reversed. Black is fending off white, who is slowly snaking his way around black's hind flanks. It's time for rear guard action. This is somewhat similiar to Diagram 1, except things are a bit more precarious. Black is on the precipice of death, and any foul-up will result in a huge win for white. So, let's take the first solution from the first example and apply it here. That means we wall off the open sides and hope white doesn't leak in. Does it work?
A black stone at M1 does indeed keep white from moving any further in on that particular side. The left side is a bit different. Now that black has moved his reinforcements into M1, white takes the opportunity to stroll into K1. Black is forced to counter at L1, but alas, this ends in a false eye and black is vanquished. There is now a Ko and a lot of black stones in line for the guillotine. What if black defends first at K1? White now takes M1, forcing black to defend at L1. White reinforces his invasion at O1 to keep black from taking two prisoners. But now black looks at his configuration, and it is grim indeed. The triad of stones at K2, K1 and L1 compose a false eye. The group is dead, and woe unto black, for his efforts are undone!
Now, let's say black puts down a stone on L1 from the very start. He is attempting a defense well away from his walls, leaving big open spaces for rapacious conquerors. It looks bad and feels bad, and the neophyte will get queasy, but not once they see they've made life. White can approach at K1, but white secures two eyes by simply placing a stone at M1. Alternately, white attacks at M1, but suddenly he's short liberties, has self-atari'd and black picks up two stones. All because black played away from the walls.
ANOTHER EDIT: Again, kudos to the commenter. In this case, white attacking at K1 DOES NOT lead to a ko unless white perpetually assaults black at L2 to keep the ko alive. Indeed, the smarter move here is to simply reinforce white's position with a stone at J1. Furthermore, if black did make the smart move and play at L1, white cannot approach at K1 for fear of black immediately capturing it with J1. Thanks again for the help!
My purpose here is to teach the beginner how to break away from the wall mindset when the situation demands it. Lots of beginner books stress that Go is a game about territory. They are right. They also stress that you need to mark and protect territory. They are right. But sometimes you have to play "in" to protect your territory from your opponent. It is not intuitive. The first reflex is to wall off that section of the board for good, but as evidenced by the situation in Diagram 2 it is not always the wisest choice.
This, I think, is the most interesting lesson culled from "Graded Go Problems for Beginners Vol. 1", at least for the uninitiated.
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Graded Go Problems Vol. 1
Though I've taken in a fair amount of Go related reading, aiming to throw myself into the online arena with some semblance of experience, I've procrastinated a bit in order to try my hand at a problem set; my very first problem set, in fact. Most readers will be familiar with it: Graded Go Problems Vol. 1 by Kano Yoshinori. Why did I start with her text?
A lot of the free problem sets available on "teh internets" suffer from some common ailments. Most are simply too difficult. Judging from personal experience I'd say the great majority of Go problems are aimed at intermediate players looking to master difficult formations like the "Rabbity Six" or else improve their speed and fluency with simpler problems of perception, such as forcing semeai in a pinch. Otherwise, most problems come with inadequate or no solutions at all. I've seen a few places where the community is allowed to discuss a problem, proposing alternate solutions, but it is relatively rare. A beginner like myself needs a clear cut solution to every problem. We also need to start at the most rudimentary level, solving problems that may seem ludicrously facile to a 15 kyuu.
Go, like so many other academic subjects, builds on itself. A keen understanding of the basic tenets of the game is essential to grasping the more complicated ones. For example, a good player should be able to recognize the beginnings of a ladder or net by mere familiarity. It is unlikely a beginner will be able to do the same. At the very start of their playing career he or she will meticulously calculate the position and steps that will lead to a ladder, understand what placement leads to where, and whether it is either beneficial or detrimental to their overall board position. While it is just as good to figure it out in a live game, it is useful to have practiced it well before hand in problem sets. As in Yoshinori's book, by presenting the same problem category to a player in a myriad different board configurations a player learns to recognize the base ordering by picking it out of the board. In essence they are detecting a signal amongst a great deal of "noise". From there rote repetition will do its work and a beginner will soon turn into an intermediate, but it must begin somewhere, and it must begin solidly.
A few cursory attempts at the same kind of problem will not yield a mastery of the subject, though a player may feel confident about their skills. When they approach the next and more difficult problem, the one that builds on the previous problem's challenge, they'll find it needs not only a new level of ingenuity to solve, but also the firm understanding of the basic idea it builds upon. If there is even the slightest vitiation in their understanding of the elementary crux of the challenge it will be a distraction from the efforts needed to consider the greater depth in the more difficult problem.
Yoshinori's book indulges that British schoolmaster side of me that likes to see a repetitious education process slowly and painfully hammer the simplest rules into a student's fragile gray matter. The problems repeat themselves, over and over again, inculcating the same lesson until it becomes a sort of neural scar tissue - as tenable and cardinal as gravity or hunger. A well trained Go player should snarl and jump at basic threats, feral even in the midst of such a refined game. Their thoughts will be on higher planes of meditation, leaving baser worries and woes to tooth and fang, or in this case, in the care of rote memorization and recognition.
There is of course the worry that this might happen:
But that's a much higher degree of the phenomenon. No doubt Yasuhiro was peering through space and time, conversing with an ethereal, misty visage of fat, when he made that move. It is probably a stone placement of significant cosmic importance, but of terrible detriment in what is,in the end, a mere base game. At least, that's how I like to explain it.
Next post: The Banana Peels of Go - Unlikely Sources of Trickery And Treachery for the Beginner, sourced from Go Problems
A lot of the free problem sets available on "teh internets" suffer from some common ailments. Most are simply too difficult. Judging from personal experience I'd say the great majority of Go problems are aimed at intermediate players looking to master difficult formations like the "Rabbity Six" or else improve their speed and fluency with simpler problems of perception, such as forcing semeai in a pinch. Otherwise, most problems come with inadequate or no solutions at all. I've seen a few places where the community is allowed to discuss a problem, proposing alternate solutions, but it is relatively rare. A beginner like myself needs a clear cut solution to every problem. We also need to start at the most rudimentary level, solving problems that may seem ludicrously facile to a 15 kyuu.
Go, like so many other academic subjects, builds on itself. A keen understanding of the basic tenets of the game is essential to grasping the more complicated ones. For example, a good player should be able to recognize the beginnings of a ladder or net by mere familiarity. It is unlikely a beginner will be able to do the same. At the very start of their playing career he or she will meticulously calculate the position and steps that will lead to a ladder, understand what placement leads to where, and whether it is either beneficial or detrimental to their overall board position. While it is just as good to figure it out in a live game, it is useful to have practiced it well before hand in problem sets. As in Yoshinori's book, by presenting the same problem category to a player in a myriad different board configurations a player learns to recognize the base ordering by picking it out of the board. In essence they are detecting a signal amongst a great deal of "noise". From there rote repetition will do its work and a beginner will soon turn into an intermediate, but it must begin somewhere, and it must begin solidly.
A few cursory attempts at the same kind of problem will not yield a mastery of the subject, though a player may feel confident about their skills. When they approach the next and more difficult problem, the one that builds on the previous problem's challenge, they'll find it needs not only a new level of ingenuity to solve, but also the firm understanding of the basic idea it builds upon. If there is even the slightest vitiation in their understanding of the elementary crux of the challenge it will be a distraction from the efforts needed to consider the greater depth in the more difficult problem.
Yoshinori's book indulges that British schoolmaster side of me that likes to see a repetitious education process slowly and painfully hammer the simplest rules into a student's fragile gray matter. The problems repeat themselves, over and over again, inculcating the same lesson until it becomes a sort of neural scar tissue - as tenable and cardinal as gravity or hunger. A well trained Go player should snarl and jump at basic threats, feral even in the midst of such a refined game. Their thoughts will be on higher planes of meditation, leaving baser worries and woes to tooth and fang, or in this case, in the care of rote memorization and recognition.
There is of course the worry that this might happen:
But that's a much higher degree of the phenomenon. No doubt Yasuhiro was peering through space and time, conversing with an ethereal, misty visage of fat, when he made that move. It is probably a stone placement of significant cosmic importance, but of terrible detriment in what is,in the end, a mere base game. At least, that's how I like to explain it.
Next post: The Banana Peels of Go - Unlikely Sources of Trickery And Treachery for the Beginner, sourced from Go Problems
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Represented in the Cabinet
There are a lot of political interests and faction strife that go into the making of a new Japanese cabinet, but I never thought I'd see a dedicated Go player make it to the top. The author of Shisaku has composed a complete roster of Japanese Prime Minister's post-defeat cabinet. Apparently, the new Cabinet Secretary, Yosano Kaoru, is a Go player and a good one at that. Scroll to the bottom of the page to find a picture of the adept 7 dan politician playing a game. Anyone care to analyze?
I mentioned this curious find to a friend of mine, who keeps me abreast of developments in Chinese literature in exchange for news on movements in the Japanese political scene.
He replied, "Who has the time to be a cabinet secretary and an expert Go player?".
"Not sure."
"Well, I guess it makes sense. Japanese 7 dan isn't what it used to be."
Zing!
Personally I'm waiting in rapt suspense for Yosano to excercise some of his Go knowhow in the current stage of his political career. Imagine him urging the LDP to take sente during a heated campaign for the House of Representatives, or making an appearance at a tournament to curry the favor of the parochial Go community.
I mentioned this curious find to a friend of mine, who keeps me abreast of developments in Chinese literature in exchange for news on movements in the Japanese political scene.
He replied, "Who has the time to be a cabinet secretary and an expert Go player?".
"Not sure."
"Well, I guess it makes sense. Japanese 7 dan isn't what it used to be."
Zing!
Personally I'm waiting in rapt suspense for Yosano to excercise some of his Go knowhow in the current stage of his political career. Imagine him urging the LDP to take sente during a heated campaign for the House of Representatives, or making an appearance at a tournament to curry the favor of the parochial Go community.
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Janice Kim's "Learn to Play Go - Vol. 1"
Just as any good author or academic would check their work against antipodal takes on their subject, so should a professional recieve council from more than one source. After happily ruminating on Cho Chikun's introductory tour of Go I decided to peruse the readings of another oft-suggested author, the infamous Janice Kim. 
In terms of subject matter and material, Janice Kim's first volume just about matches Cho's book. It spends a little more time on rudimentary basics, but covers the necessary building blocks to a good, correctly played Game of Go including ladders, nets, eyes and sound placement. But it's not what "Learn to Play Go" reviews that gives it a welcome place on the avid Go player's shelf, but how it presents that information. Go can be a cryptic and confounding game, even in its simplest shape. A cautious and lenient instructor is then required to translate the game's often incomprehensible logic into a more palatable form for the complete beginner. Kim does exactly that with her flair for capacious page design and a zen simplicity that trims excess verbiage and keeps the bare essentials.
Open the book to any page and you'll immediately find that diagrams and explanations are logically and clearly paired. There's no need to play a matching game between the expalantion for diagram 2a and the drawing that happens to be two pages away. Furthermore, there are generous margins between blocks of text and between images. Although this may seem trivial, a new player will need as few distractions as possible when staring at a diagram and playing out a complicated sequence. For example, the best way to understand a ladder is to play it out in one's mind. Doing so allows the player to see how a ladder starts and what it looks like in its primordial shape. It also encourages players to recognize when a ladder will hit or miss a stone further out in the board. However, deep meditation on the diagram may be interrupted or sidetracked by quick eye jerks to nearby text, or an adjacent figure. Suddenly the meticulously tracked ladder has vanished, and with it the patience of the frustrated student. One could play it out on the board and garner most of the aforementioned benefits, but as an advocate of the mental anguish and the successive benefits of mind play, I believe Kim's layout and design provide the best platform for strenuous, dedicated introductory study.
I do wonder about the erratic sketches found on almost every page of the book. At first they have some semblance to Go stones and grid lines, but later these frivolous doodles turn into irrelevant depictions of houses, windows, and tall six-legged creatures. Most are tucked towards the bottom of the page, far and away from anything they could detract from, but sometimes you'll be cruising along a lengthy explanation of Go theory only to fixate your eye on a monstrous stick figure of a crooked bicycle atop an elephant. Disturbing? Yes. Distracting? Thankfully, no.
If Cho Chikun's Go introduction seems a bit thick, then by all means give Janice Kim's version a try. It surrenders the more complicated discourses on third and fourth line placement to focus on secure understanding of elementary tactics - in other words, the most solid foundation available.
In terms of subject matter and material, Janice Kim's first volume just about matches Cho's book. It spends a little more time on rudimentary basics, but covers the necessary building blocks to a good, correctly played Game of Go including ladders, nets, eyes and sound placement. But it's not what "Learn to Play Go" reviews that gives it a welcome place on the avid Go player's shelf, but how it presents that information. Go can be a cryptic and confounding game, even in its simplest shape. A cautious and lenient instructor is then required to translate the game's often incomprehensible logic into a more palatable form for the complete beginner. Kim does exactly that with her flair for capacious page design and a zen simplicity that trims excess verbiage and keeps the bare essentials.
Open the book to any page and you'll immediately find that diagrams and explanations are logically and clearly paired. There's no need to play a matching game between the expalantion for diagram 2a and the drawing that happens to be two pages away. Furthermore, there are generous margins between blocks of text and between images. Although this may seem trivial, a new player will need as few distractions as possible when staring at a diagram and playing out a complicated sequence. For example, the best way to understand a ladder is to play it out in one's mind. Doing so allows the player to see how a ladder starts and what it looks like in its primordial shape. It also encourages players to recognize when a ladder will hit or miss a stone further out in the board. However, deep meditation on the diagram may be interrupted or sidetracked by quick eye jerks to nearby text, or an adjacent figure. Suddenly the meticulously tracked ladder has vanished, and with it the patience of the frustrated student. One could play it out on the board and garner most of the aforementioned benefits, but as an advocate of the mental anguish and the successive benefits of mind play, I believe Kim's layout and design provide the best platform for strenuous, dedicated introductory study.
I do wonder about the erratic sketches found on almost every page of the book. At first they have some semblance to Go stones and grid lines, but later these frivolous doodles turn into irrelevant depictions of houses, windows, and tall six-legged creatures. Most are tucked towards the bottom of the page, far and away from anything they could detract from, but sometimes you'll be cruising along a lengthy explanation of Go theory only to fixate your eye on a monstrous stick figure of a crooked bicycle atop an elephant. Disturbing? Yes. Distracting? Thankfully, no.
If Cho Chikun's Go introduction seems a bit thick, then by all means give Janice Kim's version a try. It surrenders the more complicated discourses on third and fourth line placement to focus on secure understanding of elementary tactics - in other words, the most solid foundation available.
Friday, August 17, 2007
They Just Go Together
A friend of mine came to town recently after a long absence spent in the nether regions of Texas. We immediately scheduled a meeting. I suggested we host a beer sampling, while he countered with a proposed game of Go. So we did both. The vast majority of the game was spent with an English ale - lots of caramel, chocolate and malts. Being a self-labeled beer connoisseur it seemed like the ideal drink to an ideal game. But a creeping feeling told me that something was awry, and before I knew it I was clamoring for a robust green tea. Somehow the ale had been rejected by the board and stones' aesthetic aura, and in its place a sudden inclination for Genmai-cha.
I have never before fallen out of the mood for a beer, or so strongly fallen into the mood for tea.
It is a small detail, and probably an insane one for those without gustatory leanings, but all the same proves how Go can often work on a subconscious level.
I have never before fallen out of the mood for a beer, or so strongly fallen into the mood for tea.
It is a small detail, and probably an insane one for those without gustatory leanings, but all the same proves how Go can often work on a subconscious level.
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