If a man should conquer in battle a thousand and a thousand more, and another should conquer himself, his would be the greater victory, because the greatest of victories is the victory over oneself.
The most terrible of all my battles was the one before Moscow. The French showed themselves to be worthy of victory, but the Russians showed themselves worthy of being invincible.
We didn't see [the NBA lockout] as a victory at all. It was far from what we set it out to accomplish in bargaining, but I thought it was a fair compromise.
There is no failure in life. It all depends how you take things. If you are desiring too much - you want to reach too high, and you cannot - then there is frustration and failure. But if you are not desiring anything and you are perfectly happy wherever you are, life is moment-to-moment victory.
The true sweetness of chess, if it ever can be sweet, is to see a victory snatched, by some happy impertinence, out of the shadow of apparently irrevocable disaster.