SOURCE: “Chess and Sex in Le Devoir de violence,” in Callaloo, Vol. 12, No. 1, Winter, 1989, pp. 216-32.

In the following essay, Philipson studies the parallels between Le Devoir de violence and the game of chess.

“It's a great huge game of chess that's being played—all over the world—if this is the world at all, you know.”

—Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

autobiography—Chess for me has always connoted the invincibility of the father. When I was little, my father taught me chess, and we played often. I've always believed that my father is something of a genius in spheres where logic holds sway—he is an organic chemist by profession—and his ability in chess and bridge only confirms that assumption. As a child, I was never able to beat my father at chess, even though he would give me the advantage of a knight or...