The Royal Game

Plot summary[edit]

An anonymous narrator opens the story by describing the boarding of a passenger liner traveling from New York to Buenos Aires. One of the passengers is world chess champion Mirko Czentovic. Czentovic is an idiot savant^[3] and prodigy with no obvious qualities apart from his talent for chess. The narrator plays chess with his wife, hoping to draw Czentovic's attention and engage him in a game. The narrator draws the attention of McConnor, a businessman, who offers to pay Czentovic's fee.


A group of passengers (including the narrator and McConnor) play Czentovic in a consultation game, which Czentovic wins. They are about to lose a second game when they are interrupted by Dr B., who prevents them from blundering and guides the party to a draw.


Dr B. tells his story to the narrator. He was a lawyer who managed the assets of the Austrian nobility and church. He was arrested by the Gestapo, who hoped to extract information from Dr B. in order to steal the assets. The Gestapo kept Dr B. imprisoned in a hotel, in total isolation, but Dr B. maintained his sanity by stealing a book of past masters' chess games, which he learned completely. After absorbing every single move in the book, he began to play against himself, developing the ability to separate his psyche into two personas. He spent more and more time pacing up and down his cell, mentally playing chess games. This behavior became more and more obsessive and frantic, as he gradually was losing contact with reality. At some point, he accidentally wounded himself and was carried to a hospital. A sympathetic physician, knowing of his situation, attested his insanity to keep him from being imprisoned again by the Nazis, and he was freed. The doctor advised him to avoid chess, in order not to trigger his compulsive behavior.


The passengers persuade Dr B. to play alone against Czentovic. Dr B. agrees, as he wants to know if his chess ability was real or only a self delusion, but warns that he must not be allowed to play a second game. In a stunning demonstration of his imaginative and combinational powers, Dr B. beats the world champion. Czentovic suggests another game to restore his honour, and Dr B. immediately agrees. But this time, having sensed that Dr B. was impatient when it took too long to move, Czentovic tries to irritate his opponent by taking several minutes to make each move, thereby putting psychological pressure on Dr B., who gets more and more agitated as the game proceeds. He begins to walk around the room between moves, as in a trance, rehearsing imagined matches against himself repeatedly and manically. The narrator is alarmed as he sees the old obsession resurfacing. Dr B. eventually declares a check by his bishop that isn't there: in his mind he's playing a different game from that on the board. The narrator urges Dr B. to stop playing, recalling to him the doctor's advice, awakening Dr B. from his frenzy. Dr B. resigns the game, apologizes for his outbursts, and withdraws from the board. As Dr B. leaves, Czentovic comments that he had been mounting a reasonable attack.