Profs and Pints Online presents: “How Chess Made the World,” a look at the social and cultural history of a powerful board game, with Jenny Adams, associate professor of English at the University of Massachusetts and author of Power Play: The Literature and Politics of Chess in the Late Middle Ages.

[This talk will remain available in recorded form the link given here for tickets and access.]

The Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit has won praise from several grandmasters for its “startlingly accurate portrayal of chess gameplay.”  What received less attention—but is equally worth noting—is how chess serves as a metaphor of the life of the series’ main character, Beth Harmon, who herself figuratively becomes the queen.

This show is not the only story to embrace the chess metaphor. Many writers and filmmakers continue to use chess to represent humanity’s social, political, and military negotiations.

Make a smart move and let Professor Jenny Adams, an expert on the social and cultural history of chess, tell you how the game came to represent, as Gary Kasparov once described it, "life in miniature."

She’ll start by taking us back through time to high medieval Europe, when chess entered the western world through trade with the east and quickly became one of its most popular pastimes.  This early era of chess play infused the game with its metaphorical power. We’ll look at the early literature—romances and histories— that featured the game, as well as the political works that used chess to imagine social order.

We'll wrap up with more recent uses of the chess metaphor in 2001 Space Odyssey, Star Wars, Blade Runner, the very first Harry Potter, and yes, The Queen’s Gambit. Chess fans will love every piece of this talk.

Profs & Pints Online: How Chess Made the World