How Chess Became Domesticated (Is That Good?)

“In one sense, what has happened over the past 35 years could be described as the domestication of chess: the transformation of an abstruse game allied with innate brilliance (and madness) into an educational tool for training mental skills and attitudes. The new guise goes against the Bobby Fischer image–the temperamental, egocentric high-school dropout who cultivated his American rebel aura. It may even be that the mainstreaming of the game contributed to driving the chess monomaniac underground.”