In the metaphorical world of chess perhaps one side should be theme and one side staunton. The two camps are, after all, defined, the battle characters all ready. The world is divided between the staunton and the theme, and both sides are ready to play and ready, willing, to spill blood! With the beautiful chess designs of the staunton genre available, with it's finesse, it's sleek artful knights operating in the design aspect of the chess set as the poster child of art - smooth, fine, triple weighted and finely balenced - who would ever want to mix metaphors, soil their hands, with a chess set built around some battle, some historical event, or some famous classical concoction? Although for years I resisted the lure - now, as said Job - 'mine eyes have been opened', or a better Biblical reference, providing an idea for a possible chess set design itself around the Apostle Paul's first century struggles - 'the scales have fallen from my eyes'. Hmmm... a board based on the Road to Damascus... quick, an envelope to scribble on the back of please!

The attraction is partly about oneupmanship, as outlined by this chess retail blog. The theme set owner sits smugly in the knowledge that his choice says something about him or her that is that much more cranially higher than the purchaser of a china tea set. The blog post gets into some detail about this - maybe the author is obsesssed with the need to feel superior. But with a finely detailed chess set based on the War of Independence or the American Civil War instead of the Ming Replica Vase - I'm not so sure - I think I'd feel that bit better too. So much to show off, so much to talk about and talk around. No, no - we must recoil from the idea! Superiority is not the motivation - 'we're all equal in HIS eyes'..., although perhaps more equality could be gained by a discerning, insightful selection in our lives here and there... couldn't it? Maybe?

A humbler viewpoint, and a more accurate one is that the designs of staunton are much the same with the differentiator being one piece - one overused and desperate oject of the artisans skill and talent - the knight. Staunton means that the queen has to have her coronet and the knight has to look like a horse. The castle needs a turret and the pawns look like... well.. pawns. The bishop has to have mitre and the King has to have a cross to show his leadership over the church. Not so with theme chess sets! The shackles are gone! The Isle of Lewis chess design is itself historical and is the most widely sold theme chess set,almost fitting into it's own genre between 'staunton' and 'theme'. Examples abound. Reynard the Fox, Dinosaurs, New York, The Lord of the Rings, Camelot, Golf, Columbus, Sea LIfe, Sherlock Holmes, The Range Wars, Jazz, etc. As with the staunton world, quality varies from store to store and from price band to price band. Some of the better SAC and Mascott designs are stunning in the quality of the result. Painted or decorated versions are generally superior, though the labor to decorate each piece results in what seems like a price tag out of perspective with it's plain cousin - hence the high proprtion of plain sales for theme chess sets. But the sky is the limit for ideas on theme chess designs. Take any subject and the theme chess set maker can build a set that is a celebration of the subject and has the distinction of being able to play the game of chess with it as well as it being a most fitting ornament for one's station in life. Oh!... there we go again..., think modesty, think humility! After all, not everyone has the discernment granted some of us...