Frank Healey

Frank Healey

Chess player and chess composer

(19 November 1828 in London; † 17 February 1906 in London) was a well-known English chess player, but above all a composer of chess exercises. In 1866, he published a collection of 200 of his own chess compositions, which he firmly regarded as aesthetic, even poetic achievements:

"Problems are indeed the poetry of chess. The same depth of imagination, the same quick perception of the beautiful, the same fecundity of invention, which we demand from the poet, are to be found, under a different form, in the humble labours of the problematist. Surely, without pressing the analogy too far, we may say that the thirty-two pieces form the alphabet of the composer, while the Chess board is the paper, and the positions finally resulting may be fairly likened to so many stanzas."

"Problems are truly the poetry of chess. The same depth of imagination, the same quick perception of beauty, the same fertility of invention that we demand from the poet are to be found in a different form in the humble labours of the problem composer. Certainly it may be said, without stretching the analogy, that the 32 pieces are the composer's alphabet, while the chessboard is his paper, and the positions that finally emerge may well be compared to as many stanzas."

- Frank Healey: A Collection of Two Hundred Chess Problems, Longmans, Green & Co, London 1866, p. 5
Healey's path
His most famous chess task shows the advance move, also known as Healey's move in his honour. Because of its place of publication, the Bristol theme is also widely used for this move, especially in English-speaking countries.