Wu Qingyuan, a 100-year-old Go master who passed away in 2014, pioneered new Go theories and lived a long, disciplined, serene life.
In 2014, Wu Qingyuan, who had lived to be 100, passed away.
At the age of eleven, Wu Qingyuan entered Duan Qirui’s residence as a Go player; at twenty, he traveled to Japan to play against Honinbo Shūzai, then Japan’s top Go player. During that game, an entirely new opening he created off the cuff shattered the traditional rules of Go that had been followed for over a century.During his decades living in Japan, he consistently pushed beyond the boundaries tacitly accepted by older generations of players to explore the principles of the game. Over the seventeen years from 1939 to 1956, he defeated every top Go player in Japan; the title of “Go Sage” was earned through sheer determination in game after game.
While the world knows him as a prodigious talent in the field of Go, it is also widely believed that geniuses who devote themselves so entirely to a single field rarely live to a ripe old age. Given that he had been frail since childhood and had suffered from a severe lung disease in his early years, no one ever expected him to live a full and peaceful life spanning an entire century.
Throughout his life, Wu Qingyuan enjoyed a revered status in the world of Go, yet he was never swayed by victory or defeat, fame, or external distractions. He adhered to the path of impartiality in his personal conduct, maintained a regular daily routine, and always ate a light, simple diet; even when overwhelmed with work, he never neglected to ensure his home was well-ventilated.Throughout many turbulent times and life’s ups and downs, his disposition remained gentle, fair, open-minded, and clear-sighted. He was always unconcerned with victory, defeat, gain, or loss, and never ceased his study of the art of Go, even in his later years. There is no mystery to his longevity; it is simply the result of adhering to a disciplined lifestyle and maintaining a peaceful state of mind at all times.
What he left behind for future generations was not only his reputation as the “Chess Sage,” but also chess principles—such as the “Six Harmonies” strategy and “broad-minded play”—that subsequent generations of players would spend their entire lives studying. Moreover, he bequeathed a spirit of daring to pioneer and break new ground, as well as a philosophy of life that allowed him to view the ups and downs of life with equanimity and let go of emotional entanglements.In the days ahead, the most grounded way to live is to let go of the obsession with winning and losing, and instead hold fast to the simple, genuine spirit of living an ordinary life.
