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.

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