Checkmated!  For decades, U2 has been playing chess, while most of the music world has been playing checkers.  Bono’s love for the game of chess is well documented.  Knowing Bono’s love for the abstract, loving chess should be no surprise to anyone.  Although I know how to play chess, I’m not very good at it because of my short attention sp….wait, what was I just talking about?

One of the reasons why I don’t excel in chess is because it requires you to think of future moves & I’m usually focusing on my past, wondering where did it all go wrong.  Bono, who is genetically wired to throw his two cents into everything related to anything, has thrown his support behind Garry Kasparov, who is running for president of FIDE, the world chess federation.  .

Apparently Kasparov is passionate about the same things Bono is: human rights, fighting extreme poverty and staring at a game board that 1% of the world’s population truly understands.  The game pieces in chess that epitomizes the world’s population is probably part of the reason for Bono’s love of the game.  Pawns, which there are plenty, are the smallest pieces & are considered useless, throwaway pieces with virtually no power, commanded by one king.  Like chess, as in most societies, the queen has the real power, with her ability to move in any direction she wants, as far as she wants, destroying anything that gets in her pathway, including the king.  Bono says of Kasparov, “I met the great man recently in Dublin, and heard he was running for President of FIDE. I can’t think of a more luminous mind to take that position.”

To Bono, the world is one giant chess board.  In chess, one must always be looking ahead & thinking of future moves.  Who else hatches some plot or schemes more schemes than Bono?  It doesn’t matter if it’s economic aid for someone whose name we find so hard to spell or throwing his weight behind Kasparov for president of FIDE, the last knight on earth is always there.

As in life, pawns must be sacrificed for the greater good and although I am certain that the pawns are Bono’s favorite piece on the board because of their vulnerability, he knows their limitations.  Recognizing that most pawns got rooked one way or another in this life does not sit well with Bono, which is why the last knight is always meeting with bishops, kings & queens all over this game board we call earth in hope of a better life for the little pawns.

Bono stated that, “Thinking ahead, thinking around corners, guessing somebody else’s next move… these were the pleasures of chess for me… my greatest childhood pleasure.”  Thank you for a great life indeed, considering that a majority of pawns are thinking no further ahead wondering how they’re going to sleep 3 to a bed, Sister Anne she said,  where their next meal is going to come from or how to make next months rent.

The issues of our world are complex & we need abstract thinkers to see things that a majority of us cannot see & begin to fix them.  Chess is a great game & we need more people playing it.  Can chess save the world? No, it’s too f*cking complicated.  But the players that play it can make it a better place for all of us & that’s my two cents.

> http://kasparov2014.com/2014/06/13/letter-from-u2s-bono-on-chess-and-meeting-garry-kasparov/