Midway through a game of chess, you find yourself flummoxed. You are in a losing position; you are down a pawn, and you worry that your opponent is on the cusp of cornering your king. You stare at the board and wonder if there is a way out of your predicament. For a moment, you are irritated by the rigidity of the rules. But then you discover something unexpected, and you experience not just the luscious rush of revelation, of suddenly hitting upon the right move, but also the jolt of freedom. Because you are temporarily beholden to a certain scoring system and a certain set of constraints, you perform feats of creativity that you would never otherwise have any incentive to muster. If you were not playing chess, you could simply move your pieces wherever you wanted. But because you have accepted the game’s directives, you find yourself innovating within its confines.
Review by Becca Rothfeld
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