Fuck You, Bobby Fischer: The Emotional Labour of Playing Chess as a Woman

Writing this down for the first time, it feels like a middle class origin story. I'm five years old, sitting in the 'library' of my parents' home. It's not a large room; books overflow from the shelves. Mum sits across from me, showing how the pieces move. A knight gallops in an L-shape; one, two, turn-the-corner. This is not some­thing she had expected to show her child-the chess set in the corner of the room is ornamental but the glimmering brass pieces on the leather board have caught my attention, and I'm fixated.