At war with stones on a board

Press, 18 February 1978, Page 13

At war with stones on a board

Invitation to Go. By John Fairbairn. Oxford. 85 pp. $3.55. (Reviewed by Ray Goldstein) •‘Go is a game of war,” said the Japanese master, Shukaku Takagawa. ‘‘Go is not really a game of war — it is a game of co-existence.” writes John Fairbairn in this book. As the quotations indicate, the game of Go is fraught with disagreements. Neither its object nor its history are undisputed. Even the name of the game varies; in China it is known as Wei-ch’i. Opinions differ as to what constitutes the opening, the middle, and the end game portions of play. Not surprisingly, one school prefers a centre-of-board strategy, another favours an edge-of-board approach. Although the game is at least 4000 years old, there is still no set of rules which is entirely satisfactory. The literature of the game has been called ‘‘a collector’s dream and a librarian’s nightmare.” Yet in spite of this apparent confusion, Go is played by about 10M people in Japan, and Hua only knows how many in China. In Japan, Go is firmly established: there are more than 500 professional players, rich tournaments, regular reports in newspapers, many clubs, and television appearances and advertising contracts for professional players.

Outside Japan the game attracts wide interest in Korea (as well as in China), and growing interest in Europe and North and South America. There are a handful of adherents in Australia and New Zealand, but it is fair to say that the game has not ‘‘caught on” down under. John Fairbairn’s slim volume is meant to stimulate Western interest in Go by providing a basic, step-by-step introduction to this ancient game: “An invitation written by a Western player for Western players.” It does this in a simple manner with clear diagrams and illustrations. The opening chapter is titled “It’s so easy to start,” and Fairbairn goes right to the point: “All you need to play Go are two players, a board, a set of stones, and up to one and a half hours for a friendly game.” He proceeds to set out the usual aspects of explaining any game to beginners: The rules (so far as these are agreed on), basic tactics, and so on. He ends with a summary of the game’s development, a sample of Go at its professional best, an appendix of rules, and an index of technical terms. Fairbairn does all this in a lively, direct manner and this makes up for the lack of any descriptive, historical narrative such as those contained in some standard works translated from Japanese (Shukaku Takagawa’s “How

to Play Go”) and from German (O. Korschelt’s “Theory and Practice of Go.”) The practicality of the intellectual agility involved in the game is pointed out. Competence in Go was “valued like a university degree” in China and Japan, and in the latter country “it became the practice for aristocratic

households to emply the top players. This led to rivalry between Go “families,” providng a rich tradition of classical contests.

[Dr Goldstein lectures In International relations in the political science department at Victoria University of Wellington.]