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.

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