Edward Lasker

Please do not confuse Edward Lasker with Emanuel Lasker !

Biography of Edward Lasker

Edward Lasker (1885-1981), who held degrees in mechanical and electrical engineering, learned Go from Oscar Korschelt in 1907. He authored The Game of Go which was retitled in the second edition as Go and Go Moku, one of the earliest English-language Go books. Lasker's The Game of Go should not be confused with Arthur Smith's The Game Of Go.

In 1953 he was awarded shodan and in 1971, he was awarded the prestigeous Okura Prize from Nihon Kiin.

He was a well-known chess player, too: Aged 75, he became an International Chess Master.

Famous Go Quotes by Edward Lasker

"The rules of go are so elegant, organic and rigorously logical that if intelligent life forms exist elsewhere in the universe they almost certainly play go."

tderz I would like to know for once, what Lasker really has said. I quoted him as well several times, however never directly. Who has the oldest and/or most reliable source? BTW, I thought until now that it was Emanuel who said something like this. It is not easy to verify, because the number of hits on the internet does not prove much.

EmTom No it was Edward Lasker who played GO as well. He is often confused with Emanuel Lasker - former world chess champion (1894-1921 when he lost to Capablanca). As far as I know Emanuel Lasker did not play GO.

Herman: Emanuel Lasker did in fact play Go, see http://users.eniinternet.com/bradleym/America.html for the story on both Edward and Emanual Lasker.

Links

• How Go came to America -- by Milton N. Bradley
• http://www.logicalchess.com/info/trivia/l.html
• Chess Openings tutorials excerpted from Lasker's book (and converted to algebraic notation).