PROGRESS OF GO IN EUROPE (Monthly Go Review 6/1961)
By Dr. Friedrich Lenz
Though the game of Go has become known in many countries in all parts of the world, the strength of the best players in these countries is far below that of Japanese and Chinese masters.
In other words, Europe and America are, in respect to Go, under-developed countries. As in cases of economic and industrial under-development, there may be two reasons: Either we, the people of the underdeveloped countries are less talented for Go and shall therefore never be capable of grasping the elegance of the refined playing style of oriental masters. Or we are sufficiently talented but have had bad starting conditions.
In the first case there would not be much hope of progress.
Believing in and hoping for progress, I shall therefore rather discuss the other conditions for development and how they can be improved.
The principal obstacles hindering progress are the following:
1) Most people never in their life get acquainted witln Go.
2) It is difficult to find partners of comparable strength.
3) More difficult to find masters who can criticise our mistakes and give advice for improvement.
4) There are only few books and other publications on Go in European languages.
5) The game of chess is much more popular than Go.
I shall now discuss these 5 points in more detail.
1) I think much can be done by telling one's friends, relations and colleagues about Go. The "Deutsche Go Bund" is very active in arranging public Go meetings, and inviting newspapers, television, and news reel people. From my own experience, I think, the contagion with the Go bacillus is more virulent and durable in case of personal contact than of public diffusion (and much cheaper, too).
2) The list with the addresses of Go players in all European countries edited by the "Deutsche Go Bund" is very important. I have often visited Go players of whom I only knew from this list and enjoyed many games with them.
3) It is a great help for us that strong Japanese players coming to Europe take up contact with European players. I think that a good deal of the increase of skill among the strongest European players in recent years is due to the instruction by our Japanese guests. We are extremely glad to hear that the two famous masters of 9th degree, Segoe Kensaku and Utaro Hashimoto intend to visit Europe in July and August this year and we will try to learn from them as much as possible.
4) There are a few books on Go, printed in the U.S.A., Germany and Holland. They are very valuable as first introductions for beginers but hardly apt to increase the strength beyond that of amateur Sho-Dan. Therefore we are very glad that efforts are made in Japan to print books in English language such as Honimbo Takagawa's "How to play Go" and "The Vital Points of Go" and Segoe's "Go Proverbs Illustrated". I have learned from these books some very useful tricks of which I had never heard of before. Unfortunately there are many Go players in Germany and Austria who can not read Englisln. The "Deutsche Go Bund" is editing a small Go journal in the German language, the "Europäische Go-Zeitung". It consists mainly of translations from Japanese Go magazines but because of its small extent and the translater's limited knowledge of Japanese and of Go, its standard cannot be compared
with that of Japanese Go magazines. For those wlo can read English, the new "Go Monthly Review" is also a valuable source of information.
5) Many of the people who are sufficiently talented and interested in intellectual games lilke Go and chess, are eager chess players. We have sometimes succeeded in arousing vivid interest for Go in chess clubs but in most cases this interest was of short duration only. Because of the great advantage of having many strong chess partners in each town and all sorts of chess literature, and because of the great exertion connected. with the attempt to strive for mastership most chess players could not be converted to Go for a long time.
In spite of the obstacles discussed above, Go is in steady progress in Europe. The number of Go players is increasing as well as their average skill. We have now more than a dozen Go players of amateur Sho-Dan to San-Dan strength in Germany and four in Austria, and the list of Go addresses contains about 500 names. The fact that the speed with which the number of Go players is increasing is closely connected with the number of existing Go players need not be discouraging, even if both are small. From the point of a theoretical physicist, the proportionality between a quantity and its rate of increase is characteristic of an exponential law, i.e. of progress which is slow at first but faster and faster in later stages. Thus, one day, we may be a well developed country,
too.
(Note: Dr. F. Lenz is a theoretical physicist of Tübingen University, Two-Dan in Go and one of the most active staff members of the "Deutsche Go Bund". He will come to Japan to attend the International Meeting on Physics this
autumn.)
Dernière mise à jour le 29/11/12