Shape Up!

Book excerpt: Objectives of this bookTo explain which points are vital in given shapes.To show how good shape is achieved, and bad shape exploited, in fighting contexts.To integrate shape proverbs into your knowledge of go.To look behind the proverbs to another level of more explicit mechanism, to provide supporting material, and to explain exceptions.To break down the barrier between tesuji and joseki points of view, connecting pure intuitions with learned knowledge.To demystify many common tesuji.To help the reader to visualise how and where a tesuji might happen in thefuture, a requirement for a dan player.To discuss the choice of variation at a point in a joseki, when tactical reasonsalone aren't a sufficient guide.To address as we go along questions about suji, or correct style, covering some of the content of the many texts on 'kata and suji' in the Japanese literature.To contribute to the local, critical theory of go, by attempting a systematic listing of possibilities in a pattern, with criteria for choosing amongst them.To develop an ingrained respect in the reader for the principles of good shape (for example: connect but remain light and flexible, don't fill in your own liberties without very good reason, develop rapidly but also take into account eye shape).To provide a reference on shape (there are an index of shapes and a proverb index at the end, to help you refer to particular patterns).To show in action the comparative method of go study.