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.

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