In another forum I was reading a thread on the best tactical players of all time. I’m also reading the book “Jose Raul Capablanca: A Chess Biography,” by Miguel Sanchez. I started to wonder: what games best represent the style of history’s greatest chess players? I’ve heard this player or that described as “tactical” or “positional” or “methodical.” I often wonder why, because in such discussions nobody offers any examples of games.
Such examples would be very helpful to and entertaining for players like me, players who are not experts and probably will never be. I’m 60 years old, and never played in a tournament or joined a club because I’ve never been able to work up the courage to do so. What I hope to do now, as I re-enter chess for the second time in my life, is gain a rating of my very own and have fun playing people in my age group and of roughly my level of skill. I last played competitively in the mid-1970s. I just can’t identify with the grandmasters and child geniuses that so often appear on the cover of “Chess Life,” and, I’m sorry to say, much of the conversation here sounds like experts talking to each other.
During my last go-round as a US Chess member a couple years ago, I often wished “Chess Life” had more content of interest to players who are not experts. More historical articles, without the mid-numbing level of computer-driven game analysis you usually find in the magazine, would be great. How does Morphy’s style compare with Fischer’s? How would Alekhine v. Spassky turn out? Can the great players of the past actually be said to have a style? Are there recognizable periods in the history of chess when players began to approach the game differently? What is “hypermodern”?
How about printing more short games, with minimal analysis, games that would be useful in illustrating basic concepts for us non-experts?
Oh well. Enough rambling…back to lurking.
It would be great if some of you ladies and gentlemen could post some of your favorite representative games by your chess heroes.
As a fellow dinosaur, a favorite book on this topic was IM Anthony Saidy’s “The Battle of Chess Ideas”. I have the 1972-version (which can now be purchased used for around $2 + shipping); the updated 1975-version with a chapter added for Anatoly Karpov is around $9 used. Both are in Descriptive notation, of course.
Chapter 2: “The Romantic Era” features Adolph Anderssen - Dufrense “The Evergreen Partie”.
Chapter 7: Botvinnik: The March of Science
Chapter 8: Reshevsky: The Spirit of Survival
Chapter 9: Keres: The Spirit of Attack
Chapter 10: Bronstein: The Joy of Invention
Chapter 11: Smyslov: The Joy of Discovery
Chapter 12: Tal: The Psychology of Magic
Chapter 13: Petrosian: The Age of the Anti-Hero
Chapter 14: Larsen: The Vitality of Romance
Chapter 15: Spassky: The Secrets of Caissa
Chapter 16: Fischer: The Limits of Genius.
Saidy updated his book in 1994 in algebraic and with a new title: “The March of Chess Ideas”. Besides the above:
Chapter 17: Karpov: The Profits of Precision
Chapter 18: Korchnoi: The Perils of Provocation
Chapter 19: Kasparov: The Rebirth of Creativity
Chapter 20: The Future of Chess
If you really are interested in historical comparisons and insights into the playing styles of the greats, especially of the past, I would suggest the following two books: “Masters of the Chess Board”, by Richard Reti and “The Hypermodern Game of Chess”, by Savielly Tartakower. Not only will you learn more about chess history, you will also learn much about openings, how to win won positions, and have wonderful endgames to explore. Each book describes the strengths and weaknesses of various players. These books are what I call “desert island” books to savor even if you do not play tournament chess or care about ratings, trophies, and all that jazz. There are a lot of other books that I could suggest, but that is what makes chess so interesting, the exploring for what makes the game tantalizing for its devotees.
OK, in response to the OP, I shall now post one of my grandmaster games (Kalamazoo, 1972) that I think best illustrates my style. I played the black pieces:
Thank you for the book recommendations! I ordered the 1994 edition of the Saidy book and will buy the others later. If someone describes a book as a “desert island” book, then I will have to put it on my “must buy” list. Interestingly, our local library system has a lot of chess books, but most are classified as reference books and can’t be checked out.
The Saidy book looks amazing; I hope to receive it by the end of the week.
And thank you, Bill, for sharing your game. I will print it out and play through it.
@Jim - Most of my books are in Descriptive and I still prefer it, but I have become more comfortable with Algebraic over the last couple of years. I found a beautiful chess set made from some kind of stone (maybe marble?) in a thrift store for $18, and just wrote out the Algebraic notations on strips of paper that I just lay along the side and bottom. The set is too beautiful not to use!
Every that knows me well is groaning right about now, I’m sure. For those not in the know, I am not a grandmaster. My opponent and I were both rated around 1800. (Sigh – not much has changed since then.) The game was a real game, though.
Another good book on this topic is “The Development of Chess Style” by Max Euwe which was updated by John Nunn in 1997 to use algebraic notation and cover up through Kasparov. Even better, USCF Sales currently has that on CLEARANCE for $5.
chessbase.com had a series this year where they showed four games(at a time) and you had to match the games to 4 GMs. I think they might’ve all been world champions.
