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.

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