GG Yamamoto

Takeshi Yamamoto taught calligraphy in Nara for four decades, latterly as master of his own small school, and was drawn to this by one quality: a move, once made, is made. He extends that to everybody. A misclick, an obvious slip, a checker put down in the wrong place by an opponent who immediately says so, and the answer is always the same courteous refusal, whichever side it favours. He has declined to take back three of his own that cost him matches. The last unsold scroll from his school hangs above the board at home. He extends the same courtesy in the other direction and has been beaten by it, which he mentions to nobody.