More Books and Endgame Watching By Tim Harding Russell Enterprises have long been publishing books by IM Dvoretsky, one of the best chess authors currently working. Profession: Chess Coach (Russell Enterprises 2014, 384 pages) is subtitled For Friends and Colleagues, V olume 1 ). This a review of his career, with several practical examples lightly annotated. The second volume is due out shortly, so I shall postpone my review until I can consider the two books together. This month I shall consider the fourth (2014) edition of the highly recommended Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual (large format, 524 pages) in conjunction with some practical examples from recent tournaments that I have been … [Read more...]
Chess Literature: A Question of Quality
Chess Literature: A Question of Quality By Tim Harding The founders of Quality Chess, back in 2004, were Swedish IM Ari Ziegler, Danish GM Jacob Aagaard, and Scottish GM John Shaw. In 2007, after Ziegler left to become president of the Swedish chess federation, the company moved to Scotland and two more Scottish titled players - IM Andrew Greet (previously known as a chess author for Everyman Chess) and GM Colin McNab - later joined the team. The output of Quality Chess is about evenly divided between openings and "improvement" books, the latter dealing with various aspects of chess, though not history or biography and there is little on the endgame. Possibly relevant to some readers, a … [Read more...]
The Greatest Bunratty Festival Yet
The Greatest Bunratty Festival Yet What drew more than 350 chess players to a remote hotel in the south-west of Ireland, including twelve grandmasters and many IMs just for a weekend, 20-22 February? Perhaps it was the wet, windy Irish weather. More likely, it was the beer. Most likely of all it was the traditional festival atmosphere created by the sponsor Gary O'Grady of the London Heathrow-based Blackthorne International Transport (www.blackthornetransport.co.uk) which specialises in delivery cargo to Russia. This was about the twentieth time a winter chess congress has been held in Bunratty but only the second time I have attended. The previous time was 1997 when there were only a … [Read more...]
Chinese Heading for World Domination
Chinese Heading for World Domination by Tim Harding As most readers will recall, the People's Republic of China won the chess Olympiad for the first time in Tromsø last August. The question began to be asked, how long before a Chinese player challenges for the world championship. China, it will be recalled, has already had three women's world champions, including the current holder. Several young players performed excellently and the whole team had only one lost game in the 44 played. Ding Liren, on board two, was particularly impressive. Then in December Yu Yangyi, who was also on that team, won the very strong open in Qatar, confidently crushing early leader Anish Giri in the … [Read more...]
Chess in 1865 and 1915
Chess in 1865 and 1915 by Tim Harding As usual at the start of a new year, the Kibitzer looks back to chess a century ago but, because of the First World War, 1915 was not a vintage year for chess. So, as with the column 12 months ago, I also look back 150 years. Unfortunately 1865 also was not especially memorable. As I noted in my article about 1864 and 1914, the only long-lived player of note who was active in both years was Joseph Henry Blackburne, whose biography by me is now with the publisher (McFarland). Apart from a few simultaneous exhibitions, he did little in 1915 while in 1865 he was not yet a full-time chess professional. The American Civil War ended in the Spring of … [Read more...]
Senior Moments
Senior Moments by Tim Harding Senior chess tournaments are increasing in popularity and this year the FIDE World Senior team tournament was revived. Although it drew a quite small entry, interest in future years is likely to increase and in 2015 team and individual championships are scheduled for both World and Europe seniors. A big change this year, not universally popular, was that instead of the traditional 60+ age group events (50+ for women), FIDE introduced a two-tier structure. The "real" seniors are now 65+ (players born 1949 or earlier were eligible) while a 50+ "junior senior" category was introduced. The 2014 World Seniors Congress was held at the Mediterranean Village … [Read more...]
Brown Study: A Question of Edwardian Identity
Brown Study: A Question of Edwardian Identity by Tim Harding One of the problems historians have to confront is not to mix up the people we want to write about, and in fact there was a good book on this subject in 1973, by E. A. Wrigley, called Identifying People in the Past. An updated work on this subject is badly needed in the Internet era, now that there are so many digitised sources for family history, but it needs to be done by somebody who is an expert in using genealogical sources of the hard copy variety as well as electronic sources. Maybe John Townsend, who has written two books of this type of research to do with chess players of the early nineteenth century, would care to … [Read more...]