Young Guns at Work

"To write proper "characteristics", I had to go over hundreds of games of each player. I wanted to learn what they liked and disliked, how they reacted in different situations, what was their preferred way of playing, how they handled themselves. During the first “scan”, I went relatively quickly over the games, writing down the impression from each game

..to Enemy of the People

Petr Izmailov was considered to be one of the top four players of the Soviet Union in 1929 according to Yuri Averbakh, and he was ranked around number 50 in the world at the time based on Chessmetrics methodology. Izmailov won the 1928 Championship of Soviet Russia, reached the last four of the 1929 Soviet Championship, and had a 2/2 lifetime score against Botvinnik. He was a regular winner of Siberian regional and city championships as well as a pioneer in some openings, playing a line similar to the Makogonov Attack against the King’s Indian more than ten years before Makogonov himself.

Ian Nepomniachtchi’s 30 Best Wins

Ian Nepomniachtchi’s road from Grandmaster to becoming Magnus Carlsen’s world championship challenger in 2021 was a long one.

GM in 2007 and Russian champion for the first time in 2010, Ian only hit the elite in recent years. His victory in Ekaterinburg occurred at his very first candidates tournament. In this book Grandmaster Zenon Franco analyzes Nepo’s chess through his 30 best wins and several fragments, considering his style, his strengths, as well as his weaknesses and how he has overcome them

Ein Schachbuch von Dilettanten für Dilettanten

Robert Hübner ist immer für Überraschungen gut. Neben vielen Aufsätzen und gelegentlichen Vorträgen deutete dies bereits sein Erstlingswerk Fünfunfünzig feiste Fehler von 1990 an. Er ist wohl der einzige deutschsprachige Autor, der es nicht nur liebt, sondern auch versteht, fundierte Schachanalysen hin und wieder mit einer Prise hintergründigem und zuweilen skurrilem Humor zu würzen, ohne dabei den Bezug zur Lebenswirklichkeit zu verlieren. Das ist auch bei seinem neuesten Werk mit dem Titel SCHUND der Fall.

Introduction

Half a century ago I left a country, the red color of which dominated a large portion of the world map. One way or another, the fate of almost every single person described in this book is forever linked with that now none-existent empire. Many of them ended up beyond its borders too. Cultures and traditions, and certainly not least of all a Soviet mentality, couldn’t have just left them without a trace. Having been transplanted into a different environment, they had to play the role of themselves apart from certain corrections with regard to the tastes and customs of a new society. Nevertheless, every one of them, both those who left the Soviet Union, and those who stayed behind, were forever linked by one common united phenomenon: they all belonged to the Soviet school of chess.

A Memoir of Players, Games and Engines

Larry Kaufman can safely be called an exceptional chess grandmaster

Larry Kaufman started out as a prodigy, however not in chess but as a whizz kid in science and math. He excels at shogi (Japanese chess) and Go, and is also a world-famous computer programmer and a highly successful option trader. Remarkably, as a chess player he only peaked at the weirdly late age of fifty.

Selected Games of Alvis Vitolins

Alvis Vitolins (1946-1997) was a seven-time chess champion of Latvia, a player with a ferocious attacking style, and one of the game’s last true openings innovators in the pre-computer age. He was a world-class blitz player and was a regular blitz sparring-partner of his friend, world champion Mikhail Tal. Vitolins often deployed gambits, and his attack-minded novelties in the Ruy Lopez, Sicilian, Nimzo-Indian and Bogo-Indian set trends that were copied at top-level chess, including in world championship and candidates matches. He gained the International Master title in 1980.

Schach hat längst die ganze Welt erobert und gehört zum Kulturerbe der Menschheit. Besonders verehrt werden die Weltmeister des Denksports. Doch um eine Glanzpartie zu spielen, muss man nicht unbedingt ein Champion sein. In diesem Buch werden 18 Meister aus 15 Ländern vorgestellt, die ein beachtliches künstlerisches Erbe hinterlassen haben. In ihrer jeweiligen Epoche zauberten sie brillante Züge und elegante Kombinationen aufs Schachbrett. Jeder von ihnen verdient unsere Bewunderung!

Mit einem Vorwort und Analysen von Großmeister Artur Jussupow

The publication is a continuation of the project to publish all the available games annotated by the Fourth world chess champion Alexander Alekhine. These are not only his own games but also games by other players for which he contributed notes in various publications.

Peter Romanovsky (1892-1964) was Soviet chess champion in 1923 (outright) and 1927 (jointly with Bogatyrchuk). According to Chessmetrics he was ranked 12th in the world in 1925. Romanovsky was also one of Soviet chess’s greatest teachers, standing at the very foundation of the Soviet Chess School. His pupils included Averbakh, Zak, Alatortsev, Lisitsin and many others, and he provided much guidance to Botvinnik in his early career. Author of 16 books, Romanovsky stood for active, fighting and objective chess where the requirements of the position took precedence over positional rules of thumb.

Masterpieces and Dramas of the...

In his three-volume treatise, leading Russian chess historian Sergey Voronkov vividly brings to life the long-forgotten history of the Soviet championships held in 1920-1953. Volume I covers the first 10 championships from 1920-1937, as well as the title match between Botvinnik and Levenfish. The key contestants also include world champion Alekhine and challenger Bogoljubov, lesser-known Soviet champions Romanovsky, Bogatyrchuk, Verlinsky, and Rabinovich, and names that today will be unfamiliar yet were big stars at the time:

Riumin, Alatortsev, Makogonov, Rauzer, Ragozin, Chekhover, and many others.

2020 Games in 20 Moves or Less

Enter the world of chess miniatures where games are decided in 20 moves or less! Marvelous Modern Miniatures features the largest collection of miniatures chess games played in the last half-century. Over 500 pages of cut and thrust!

Exploring the Most Difficult Challenge

Magnus Carlsen is arguably the strongest player of all time. His dominance is such that every loss comes as a shock. They remind us that even he has his weak moments. In fact, identifying the root causes of his losses holds valuable lessons for all players.

441 Fully Annotated Games

A new Volume in this hugely popular series by the high priest of attacking chess, US National Master Joel Johnson. A mixture of Reader Games, Student Games, Joel Johnson Games, other Master Games, and Games from around the globe. Often, the games are not perfect, which enables mortals to learn a great deal about attacking themes and aggressive play. Many highly effective and baffling ideas to beat other amateurs with.

485 Seiten, kartoniert, englisch, 1. Auflage 2020

Learn From the Greatest Players Ever

Grandmaster Joel Benjamin introduces all seventeen World Chess Champions and shows what is important about their style of play and what you can learn from them. He describes both their historical significance and how they inspired his own development as a player.

Benjamin presents the most instructive games of each champion. Magic names such as Kasparov, Capablanca, Alekhine, Botvinnik, Tal, and Karpov, they’re all there, up to current World Champion Magnus Carlsen. How do they open the game?