Most of these proverbs were collected by S.Coffin and he kindly gave me permission to publish the list. Some of these proverbs were merged into the Internet Go Dictionary.

The aphorisms by Pierre Audouard appeared between 1994 and 1995 in the French Go Review under the title "Some words about Go", and signed by Jean de Laveline (pseudonym of Pierre Audouard) and were translated by Tom Keel.

By default the proverbs are shown in a predefined order Alternatively, you can have them shuffled (the order is randomized) or ordered by author.

• Pon-nuki is worth thirty points  --  anonymous
• Do not make moves that strengthen your opponent!  --  anonymous
• Don't peep at cutting points  --  anonymous
• More haste less speed.
  Fairbairn, John
• Territory really exists only in the end.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Sacrifice small to take large  --  anonymous
• Atari, atari is vulgar play  --  anonymous
• Connect with good shape  --  anonymous
• If you lose by one point, take a rest  --  anonymous
• Go is essentially a form of harmony. Go in the 21st century will have to be go of the 'harmony of the six points - the four quarters, the above and the below.' As in life we will need to view the whole rather than the part. Japanese go has focused too heavily on the local (joseki) rather than the whole for 300 years. The reason the Chinese and Koreans are overtaking the Japanese is that they are closer to achieving this whole-board view.
  Go Seigen, 9p, 1994
• On the second line six die, eight live  --  anonymous
• Everything would seem to be possible in go. Like pulling a rabbit, by a magical move, out of a hat.
  Audouard, Pierre
• You must incessantly question yourself about this time and this space.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Very few good moves are played.
  Audouard, Pierre
• To do or not to do something is not determined by what is done in general, any more than by what is necessary. Doing or not doing something is determined by what you want, and to want in go is to want to win.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Don't be greedy!  --  anonymous
• The game plays itself, the players don't control it.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Grab the shape points as kikashi  --  anonymous
• 5 lines for extension in front of shimari
  Yang Yilun, 7p
• (Any move that follows the rules is legal). Possibilities differ according to strength.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Don't try to enclose an open skirt  --  anonymous
• To invade, need 20 points in open area; otherwise, keshi is best.
  Yang Yilun, 7p
• When you study joseki, you lose two stones in strength  --  anonymous
• Don't count territory held by only one eye!  --  anonymous
• Make your own groups strong first, then attack  --  anonymous
• Grab the border point between two moyos  --  anonymous
• If you plan to live inside enemy territory, play directly against his stones  --  anonymous
• Only amateurs try to come up with fancy moves  --  anonymous
• Good moves and bad moves are bedfellows  --  anonymous
• The strong player plays straight, the weak diagonally  --  anonymous
• Keshi is worth as much as an invasion!  --  anonymous
• Keep away from thickness  --  anonymous
• If you don't know ladders, don't play go  --  anonymous
• Fill in a semiai from the outside  --  anonymous
• Don't disturb symmetry  --  anonymous
• The simplest move is the best move  --  anonymous
• One point in the center is worth ten in the corner  --  anonymous
• Don't make empty triangles  --  anonymous
• When in doubt, remove the enemy stones from the board.
  Taylor, Bill
• Learning josekis by heart is useless if you don't try departing from them.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Always remember, keep the balance (between territory and influence)
  Figaro
• Josekis are not fixed, definitive things. They indicate the moments when everything can change.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Keep inessential ataris till the end  --  anonymous
• Keep sente in the opening. A premature attack loses sente  --  anonymous
• This time and this space have certain properties, and for a long time, to progress means to become familiar with them.
  Audouard, Pierre
• There are possible things, impossible things, and things that happen. Sometimes things happen that were impossible.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Go is not a blocking game, it's a game of action.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Seek small gains but incur big losses  --  anonymous
• Play slow, win slow; play fast, lose fast  --  anonymous
• Five groups might live but the sixth will die  --  anonymous
• One is never aware enough of the violence in go.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Nothing requires doing this or that, but necessity exists.
  Audouard, Pierre
• For the comb formation in the corner, dame is necessary  --  anonymous
• Win the early ko to win the game  --  anonymous
• Take the cutting stone on the second line  --  anonymous
• At the head of three stones in a row, play hane  --  anonymous
• Go is a game of chance where the strong player is he who renders circumstances favorable with tricks.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Keep your own stones connected, and your opponent's apart.
  Taylor, Bill
• If you cannot succeed, then die gloriously
  Chinese proverb
• Each step in a ladder is worth 7 points  --  anonymous
• Balance is not what players strive for, and if it does arise, it is in spite of them.
  Audouard, Pierre
• To reduce an opponent's large prospective territory, strike at the shoulder  --  anonymous
• There are players who clack down ridiculous moves. Certain others place their moves with crisp, dry contact, like bones cracking. Still others drop their stones with a soft sound.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Know the eye-stealing tesuji  --  anonymous
• A knight's move near the edge of the board cannot be cut.
  Taylor, Bill
• You can hide nothing on the goban.
  Audouard, Pierre
• The poor player plays the opponent's game for him  --  anonymous
• If one player chooses influence, the other player may choose territory, and vice versa  --  anonymous
• Avoid the plate connection  --  anonymous
• Strange things happen at the one-two points  --  anonymous
• In the opening, when you don't know what to play, make a shimari.
  jansteen
• If White takes all four corners, Black should resign; if Black takes all four corners, Black should also resign.
  Kent, David
• When in a winning position, keep the game simple; Make it complex only when losing  --  anonymous
• Be a little patient. Keshi works!  --  anonymous
• There is damezumari at the bamboo joint  --  anonymous
• Learn the eye-stealing tesuji  --  anonymous
• There is a time and a space which are the same in all go games: the alternating of black and white, and the intersections.
  Audouard, Pierre
• The carpenter's square becomes ko  --  anonymous
• Extend one hand from the cross-cut  --  anonymous
• Don't make a play adjacent to a cutting-point  --  anonymous
• A meijin needs no joseki  --  anonymous
• From a cross-cut, extend  --  anonymous
• Shoulder connections, hanging connections, and knight's move connections  --  anonymous
• Every move brings change.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Strange things happen at the one-two points  --  anonymous
• When your opponent has two weak groups, attack them both at once  --  anonymous
• Use a wall to attack, not to make territory  --  anonymous
• Don't play on dame points, but guarantee connections  --  anonymous
• Ikken tobi is never wrong  --  anonymous
• The second line is the line of defeat, the third line is the line of territory, and the fourth line is the line of influence  --  anonymous
• At the head of two stones in a row, play hane  --  anonymous
• Sometimes an idiotic stone loafs about the goban.
  Audouard, Pierre
• You must always consider the circumstances. Nothing is identical, yet things repeat.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Never try to cut bamboo joints  --  anonymous
• There is death in the hane  --  anonymous
• Contesting, destabilizing, and threatening are sources of transformation.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Knight's moves win running battles  --  anonymous
• From the way the players perceive what can happen and what shouldn't happen springs what happens.
  Audouard, Pierre
• One big eye kills one small eye  --  anonymous
• Conservative and slow will win. Believe it!  --  anonymous
• The rectangular six is normally alive  --  anonymous
• Never be too sure about your plan, and always doubt your ability to kill your opponent's stones.
  zhong-pu liu, 1078 AD
• If you have won four corners, resign  --  anonymous
• The nature of a game comes from what is played, but it's the sensitivity to the possible and the impossible that gives it value.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Those who are good at winning, don't usually fight.
  zhang, 1078 AD
• Use the Knight's move to attack, the 1-point jump to defend  --  anonymous
• With less than 15 stones in danger, tenuki  --  anonymous
• Defend weak groups, not strong groups  --  anonymous
• Everything happens on a grid-engraved board with black and white pieces, but if that's all you see then you don't know Go.
  Audouard, Pierre
• If a formation is symmetrical, play at the center  --  anonymous
• Big groups never die  --  anonymous
• Don't make compact groups of stones  --  anonymous
• The possibility or impossibility of an event results logically from the rules.
  Audouard, Pierre
• There is a time for doing things.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Don't make territory near thickness  --  anonymous
• Capture what you cut off  --  anonymous
• Those who are good at making shape don't usually fight.
  zhang, 1078 AD
• With only one group, you will win  --  anonymous
• Grab the 4th point of the bamboo joint.
  Taylor, Bill
• If there is no stone on the handicap point, the carpenter's square is dead  --  anonymous
• Sacrifice and squeeze  --  anonymous
• A basic: Don't push too hard.
  jansteen
• Does white await black's errors? Certainly, in two ways: either he makes clean, clear, dangerous moves; or he makes confusing, twisted moves that are just as dangerous. The adequate answers are always difficult to find.
  Audouard, Pierre
• In the corner, five stones in a row on the third line are alive  --  anonymous
• Don't make dango's  --  anonymous
• In the sound of the stone your can hear its purpose.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Don't play in direct contact with the opponent's stone caught in your squeeze-play  --  anonymous
• There are players who don't accept exchanges: they play many moves that perpetuate a previous state of the game.
  Audouard, Pierre
• If black doesn't pile up enough errors to lose, then it will soon be time to lower the handicap.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Six eyes in a rectangle are alive  --  anonymous
• The L-group is dead  --  anonymous
• Against three in a row, play right in the center  --  anonymous
• The semeai where only one player has an eye is a fight over nothing  --  anonymous
• Proverbs do not apply to White.
  Sand, Tero
• The weak player fears ko, the strong player seeks it.
  Taylor, Bill
• Sacrifice for shape  --  anonymous
• The saki bottle shape is negative  --  anonymous
• Hane? Extend! Make it a habit  --  anonymous
• Answer the keima with a kosumi  --  anonymous
• You have to like to win, and to learn to recognize the errors that gave you the victory.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Beware of going back to patch up your plays  --  anonymous
• Thickness? Ladders always work! [or don't work if it belongs to your opponent!]  --  anonymous
• Territory is a closed space where time no longer exists. The transformation around it slowly alter it, and sometimes it cracks open like a rotten egg at the least shock.
  Audouard, Pierre
• To emphasize the lack of determination in his moves, one speaks of chance.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Empty triangles are bad  --  anonymous
• Attach to the strongest stone in a pincer  --  anonymous
• White is always trying to kill a bigger group than black is trying to save  --  anonymous
• In an unreasonable situation, an unreasonable move is reasonable
  Tamino
• Don't reduce your own liberties.
  Taylor, Bill
• The intersection is rarely neutral.
  Audouard, Pierre
• (A shicho works or doesn't work, but sometimes you don't see it, you don't play it). The possible and the impossible are visible and invisible. What happens is always what you see, what is played.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Strike at the waist of the knight's move  --  anonymous
• On the third line, four die, six live  --  anonymous
• Make a fist before striking
  Kim, Jay H.
• If your stone is capped, play the knight's move  --  anonymous
• Add one stone, then sacrifice both  --  anonymous
• There are times when even a fight over nothing means something  --  anonymous
• Don't overlook the edge of the board  --  anonymous
• Stop on second, extend on third  --  anonymous
• Error is one of the sources of transformation.
  Audouard, Pierre
• It is difficult to know exactly what you are doing.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Eyes win semiais  --  anonymous
• There are lines, like roots, that plunge into the stone and shatter it.
  Audouard, Pierre
• If there is a ko inside a semeai, capture it on the final play  --  anonymous
• 2-1 is the vital point in the corner  --  anonymous
• Corner, side, centre  --  anonymous
• Beginner's games are surprising, often incoherent and incomprehensible. When you improve, your game gains in consistency but flirts with stupidity: you become satisfied with truisms and mechanical movements, you try to obtain a feeling for clearness and style the easy way.
  Audouard, Pierre
• There is no territory in the centre  --  anonymous
• Learn to play under the stones  --  anonymous
• There is a thin line between thick and slow.
  jansteen
• When your opponent is thick, you must also become thick.
  Otake Hideo, 9p
• Beware of the clumsy double contact  --  anonymous
• Five liberties for tactical stability  --  anonymous
• Attack two weak groups simultaneously  --  anonymous
• Fighting must not be the key to go, it should be reserved as your last resource.
  zhong-pu liu, 1078 AD
• Do not fear furikawari  --  anonymous
• The book says don't fight (The pen is mightier than the sword). But what else can be expected from a book (written by a pen)?  --  anonymous
• For rectangular six in the corner, dame is necessary  --  anonymous
• Dead group? Always win ko fights!  --  anonymous
• Turn, turn, turn!
  Taylor, Bill
• Don't get surrounded! Ever!  --  anonymous
• The comb formation is alive  --  anonymous
• The enemy's vital point is your own  --  anonymous
• Groups mustn't float  --  anonymous
• Win the stones, lose the game  --  anonymous
• If you have lost four corners, resign  --  anonymous
• If you have one stone on the third line, add another, then abandon both of them  --  anonymous
• The monkey jump is worth eight points  --  anonymous
• The ax's handle rots while the mind lives to the rhythm of the stones.
  Audouard, Pierre
• Don't defend - extend!
  Taylor, Bill
• In opponents' sphere of influence, avoid sharp conflict, don't move too deep
  Otake Hideo, 9p
• The stone in the bowl is idiotic.
  Audouard, Pierre