Table Of Content

A Book of Chess C.H.O’D. Alexander Bobby Fischer’s dramatic World Championship win over Boris Spassky was headline news throughout the world. It has transformed the world of chess, opening up new horizons for players at every level. A Book of Chess is the first complete, illustrated survey of all aspects of the game since chess became news. A Booh of Chess is a considered view, by the distinguished chess musk correspondent of the Sunday Times and the Financial Times, of the essence of chess, the source of its fascination throughout X IV® W ,\ fc, ®^®l fifteen hundred years of history. It combines an immensely readable survey of professional play in the Soviet Union and jjri Lii - 1 ri the West (Just how does a Grandmaster make it to the top? i - \ | How does he live? How does he stay there?) with a discussion of the philosophy of the game, and what it has to tell us about ®^k>' §j 1 ij the workings of the brain and the nature of thought. He |r m considers the problems facing computer programmers and the ®PW 11| jL chance that one day a computer program will be able to beat kw / ^ j: any human player. Also covered are the ‘mechanics’ of chess ■ (Board, rules, clocks, pieces, etc.), the amateur game in all its aspects, and the highways and byways of chess - problems and studies, alternative forms, and related games such as three-dimensional chess, Shogi (Japanese chess) and Go. A further section, the iconography of chess, covers the role of chess in art, literature and within our present-day consumer culture. It includes stories and extracts from novels about chess. Scattered through the book are about thirty fully annotated games. C.H.O’D.Alexander, in a long and distinguished career, has discussed and analysed the game with its leading exponents in the East and the West, and he has enlivened his text with stories and anecdotes about famous players. For the book, he arranged a detailed and controversial interview with one of the world’s best players, the Danish Grandmaster, Bent Larsen. A Book of Chess has been edited and designed by Derek Birdsall, who collaborated with C.H.O’D.Alexander on the Penguin Fischer v. Spassky. It is illustrated throughout with a unique collection of photographs, diagrams, drawings and engravings. $10.00 Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2019 with funding from Kahle/Austin Foundation https://archive.org/details/bookofchess0000alex State of Vermont Department of Libraries Northeast Regional Library P. 0. Box 188 St. Johnsbury, Vt. 05819 A Book of Chess * ; ' JPo: & cprte ctucffc fyyuX <§em of te 2rt$ <$a<ltyfj& *rrffpw*^*****l*e rfst© «4«t te W Sm3a te W an?, offbM* of a Km t* tff of a ctuef &flc .ant writ not fcwge te & fuftejwty f* fr $%V %** %m \Snt> 4esfKt djrta<$ 4&tme .<$»< ^»»ft6 d fy$ mat) name* $co»« «w«j $&n> $te Gpij ty© to gangcot) (fctwffe for a© mocfr a© $ wjWty %njof 4 g fw*C f£f ,an© «CfS<£ ft© §r $a© ty tetmterf «unc»firo«te te<$« ^«S ♦ (PPV % anty fym mm $a( Git) c&ty tw tCo^ng auo »%o Sk« mote fermentcorner fbt a© mtxfraed^tei not tytofytit trx>u$ fbt teas ' of w fetf J mafic »o fbttt J ogt ©t> e$c &mty <& ©$ ...... *$t $afctoto$«%f / QjtoSfr ffextteftottofte 3») B&eSipfe at temotrcoi} fy {$tfbfo t ribe ejaj 8j» muft £ Softy not fee $af comt te #e cuyf <wty Wou© ftp& out n<j$t, Q£no «ff» fcfbtfee $e p$i(bfop§t* a© |t Sent WiKK-i teSato ^© trt$ • fjit Sof t$a( fbfctleo <tfte* §jw? fagty Yh'.Y ■ fe Sft© Oapm© fo 9e4 S»ngfu^]p-fc^n« $ aufSaty <m0 fbgty to tfy ptt© anty & ftpETe ' i© firftet tittO mote metaitem te ty* 6p ft ®»ng g $««<$* fuf 1u i gcmcn( /<$»«, ^< j &»tef««*ty te tp : "'■ V%»SP Y- ,: #■ - : . .O'"'- .,Y-' By the same authors '::h % Fischer v. Spassky:Reykjavik 1972 _;x> Edited and designed by Derek Birdsall Harper & Row 4 * w * (two dfypifa of fiift t«Kkfc S&tfba tfy: ttxtxtf tfc pCagc Sa© f»un&9 ano m««0? CapitwCo it) Sjc <nufc0 tSfetfbr* fi^ie p&£« %av fbumsnfcsj ifjj t firfi ISao fot fo eomcte sno t<ptcu< t$e Spng fot e$«s tnjCmccoJod) fa®e tfke pC«£* /Qtn&gi <B« 6j»nc finpgBete-ano gtnhfmct) of $*© «>utf pCaje mcnicjCfS gwtfgof .<$« Srauttt *«0 nouoCfrt of $t pDjpf. Q?nS tsfitto to pkpo aga>mft t§« pBi&sfop|et / de jjBi&fcffSt* awfIBcr© ano fag© to Bgaj t$at Bit not fe oooij / But gf firft fetnpo $c my«$t C|t 6gng fig© |*t ®a© rtfon «nb? t$af % IBofo put fyrt) t» t$« pjgij to Cttn* Bit / C§in t$c p%&fopB:t &g«n fe by C.H.O’D.Alexander Harper & Row Publishers New York, Evanston, San Francisco, London All rights reserved. Printed in Great Britain. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address Harper & Row, Publishers, Inc., 10 East 55rd Street, New York, N.Y. 10022. © C.H.O’D.Alexander and Derek Birdsall 1973 FIRST U.S. EDITION 1973 0-06-010048-6 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOG CARD NUMBER: 73-11894 Made and printed in Great Britain by Westerham Press Ltd, Westerham, Kent Set in Monotype Walbaum The authors would like to thankF.D.Buck, G.H.Diggle, Edna Ellis, John Ernest, Peter Jay & Clive Phillpot for their help in the preparation of this book Designed and produced by Omnific/London Art Editor: Fiona MacGregor Picture research: Zoe Henderson Contents Prologue Section 1: The nature of Chess Chapter 1: The game and its players 11 Chapter 2: Chess and computers 21 Chapter 3: Illustrative games by men, women, children — and computers 25 Section 2: The history and development of Chess Chapter 4: Fourteen centuries of Chess 37 Chapter 5: The dialectic of Chess: the development of style 47 Chapter 6: Games illustrating the development of style 56 Section 3: Chess for blood Chapter 7: A day in the life of an Olympiad 71 Chapter 8: The tournament circuit 7 7 Chapter 9 : Profile of a Grandmaster 86 Section 4: Chess for fun Chapter 10: The Amateur game 97 Chapter 11: Variants of the game 101 Chapter 12: Problems and endgame studies 117 Section 5: The Iconography of Chess Chapter 13: Chess and visual Art 131 Chapter 14: Chess and Literature 137 Bibliogra phy 157 Index 158 6 Prologue The scene is the USSR v. Yugoslavia match at the 1972 Skopje Olympiad; on the right, the top board game, where Svetozar ‘Chess ... is a foolish expedient for making idle people Gligoric, the leading Yugoslav Grandmaster since 1945, is play¬ believe they are doing something very clever, when they are ing the Soviet ex-World Champion Tigran Petrosian. Many of only wasting their time.’ Bernard Shaw the older spectators - and certainly Gligoric and Petrosian - will remember their encounter at Belgrade eighteen years earlier ‘ . . . master chess grips its exponent, shackling the mind and when Gligoric won a famous victory and ‘. . . pandemonium brain so that the inner freedom and independence of even the broke out at the end of the game, and the playing hall, which strongest character cannot remain unaffected. ’ Einstein was overflowing with spectators, was cleared by the police. While this expulsion was in progress the players’ clocks were ‘My entire life has been devoted to the game ... I don’t stopped and the lights turned out and after about half an hour believe a day has gone by that I have not played at least one some of the spectators were allowed to return to their seats and game of chess - and I still enjoy it as much as ever.’ play (in the other games) was able to continue.’* But this game F.J.Marshall, former US champion is only one of about 150 in progress; 63 countries from every continent in the world, ranging in strength from the World ‘Chess is a sea in which a gnat may drink and an elephant Champions, the USSR, to the Virgin Islands are contesting the may bathe.’ Indian Proverb 20th chess Olympiad, and 23 women’s teams are playing for the Women’s Team Championship. Each of the players is wholly absorbed in his game; whether you are good or bad, nothing else matters when you are playing. This obsession doesn’t just affect the players - it spreads to anyone with an emotional stake in the games. As well as playing in these events, I have frequently been non-playing captain of the English team; then one is as completely involved as if playing - I always used to go away from the games for periods, not through lack of interest but in an attempt to avoid getting too tense and transmitting nervousness to the players. The Olympiad, although the biggest of all the international events, is very far from being the only one. There are many other team events such as the European Team Championship, the six-country West European team tournament and indi¬ vidual matches between countries; there are student team tournaments and events at the school level such as the Glorney Cup in which England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, France and Holland compete. Important though these team events are, we still have not come to the heart of the chess scene - the individual tourna¬ ments and matches. First there is the cycle of events culminating in the gladiatorial displays of the World Championship matches, such as the 1972 Fischer-Spassky struggle - an Icelandic saga indeed. Then there are about 30 international tournaments a ♦The Skopje game was less dramatic than this; after a hard struggle in which Petrosian was under some pressure, the game was drawn in 41 moves.