Chess

“But why wouldn’t such a rapid rise to fame send an empty head like that into a spin?” concluded my friend, who had just related some classic examples of Czentovic’s childishly authoritative manner. “Why wouldn’t a twenty - one - year - old country boy from the Banat start putting on airs when pushing some pieces around on a wooden board is suddenly earning him more in a week than his whole village back home makes in an entire year of woodcutting and the most backbreaking drudgery? And, actually, isn’t it damn easy to think you’re a great man if you aren’t troubled by the slightest notion that a Rembrandt, Beethoven, Dante, or Napoleon ever existed? This lad has just one piece of knowledge in his blinkered brain—that he hasn’t lost a single chess game in months—and since he has no idea that there’s anything of value in the world other than chess and money, he has every reason to be pleased with himself.”

Stefan Zweig