Most woodpushers spend an hour or two at the board to relax. They play chess strictly for fun.
But real addicts are not hard to spot. In his witty essay CONCERNING CHESS H.G. Wells wrote in 1901:
"There is a class of men who gather in coffee-houses and play
with a desire that dieth not, and a fire that is not quenched.
The passion for playing chess is one of the most unaccountable in
the world. It is the most absorbing of occupations, the least
satisfying of desires, an aimless excrescence upon life. It
annihilates a man.
"You have, let us say, a promising politician, a rising artist
that you wish to destroy. Dagger or bomb are archaic, clumsy, and
unreliable -- but teach him, inoculate him with chess! Our
statesmen would sit with pocket boards while the country went to
the devil, and our breadwinners would forget their wives in
seeking after impossible mates."
Other novelists have explored this magnificent obsession. Stefan Zweig in THE ROYAL GAME sought to explain how men could dedicate 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 years to the ludicrous task of cornering a wooden king on a wooden board. Vladimir Nabokov in THE DEFENSE spoke of the "abysmal depths" of chess. And Freudians compare the goal of checkmating an enemy king to an unconscious Oedipal desire to kill our father.
Yet the appeal of chess through the ages is no great mystery. Ex-world champ Mikhail Botvinnik said it made him feel truly alive because it forced him to think. "Perhaps chess is useful for the banal reason that it demonstrates to children that thinking is not boring!" observed another player recently.
Some diehards on Internet in a forum called "rec.games.chess" compiled a daffy list of symptoms that distinguish chess addicts from other people. Chess widows, of course, will instantly recognize these 15 telltale signs:
1. Looks at a newspaper's chess column before any other section. 2. Mumbles "J'adoube" when bumping into things. 3. Keeps a chess book and chess set in the bathroom. 4. Asks new acquaintances if they know how to play chess. 5. Asks all chessplayers, "What's your rating?" 6. Directly walks to the games/chess section in any bookstore. 7. Owns more books about chess than any other subject. 8. Owns more chess clocks than watches. 9. Keeps a board and pieces at the office or in a backpack. 10. Multiples 8x8 faster than 7x7. 11. Thinks "the olympics" take place every two years. 12. Names first child Bobby or Judit and decorates nursery in black and white squares "just in case." 13. Panics for an instant when a waiter says "Check?" 14. Pays more attention to the game in a movie than the action. 15. When asked about that movie, says a white square was not in the right hand corner of the board.
Source: Evans on Chess. May 5, 1995. from Chess Connection