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Chessville
Advertise to Single insert:
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According to the publisher’s “blurb” (as I like to call it):
Lofty goals indeed! The problem is that the book only achieves these goals inconsistently, though to its credit it does meet them more often than not – a fairly impressive feat given that every major opening is dealt with in a single volume of only 224 pages.
delivered, a basic discussion of most openings and their respective main lines, plans, and strategies. Despite having first come out in 1949, this is an incredibly popular book even today, but frankly, I’m not sure why. The fact of the matter is that it is terribly, terribly out-dated.
“Yes, Evan, of course the theory is outdated, but the ideas are still the same. That’s the whole point of the book! It’s called The Ideas Behind the Chess Openings, not The Latest Cutting Edge Opening Theory for All Time!” I hear some variation of this comment all the time, uttered with an air of finality, as though to conclude the matter definitively. However, such comments completely miss the point: it’s not just the theory that is outdated; it’s the ideas as well. There’s a connection between opening theory and opening ideas, and both have progressed to such a degree as to make many of Fine’s comments quaintly obsolete.
For example, Fine says that the Scandinavian “cannot be recommended,” implying that it is an unsound opening; but we've known since at least the mid-90's that it is a perfectly sound (if somewhat unambitious) defense. For another example, he calls the Advance Variation of the Caro-Kann “mostly harmless” (okay, I’m paraphrasing for Douglas Adams fans . . . ) when we know now that White has ways to secure at least a small advantage (for example, after 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 Bf5 White can either play Nc3 and g4 and play for an attack or simply consolidate the spatial advantage with moves like Nf3, Be3, Be2, etc.) The worst is his treatment of the Sicilian. He lays out some general strategic advice that is horribly, horribly wrong. For example, he says that Black should never play ...e5 because the pawn on d6 is a severe weakness. Yet many, many, mainstream lines of the Sicilian (most notably several lines within the Najdorf) involve ...e5. (Notice too that he includes no discussion of the Najdorf at all!) Yes, the d6 pawn is a potential weakness, but the point is that Black trades that weakness for dynamic counter-play, as is often the case in modern openings.
It’s true that not all of his discussions are flawed; for example, his discussions of classical 1.e4 e5 and 1.d4 d5 openings are fairly good. However, that’s the irony: in order to know which parts of the book are worth reading, you’d already have to understand the ideas behind the chess openings! This defeats the very purpose for which the book was written. As a result, I simply cannot in good conscience recommend this book to aspiring players wanting to get a basic understanding of various openings.
Given the obsolete nature of this work, it’s surprising that there haven’t been more attempts to create a newer work that could better fulfill Fine’s goals. One especially good attempt is Gabor Kallai’s two volume work, Basic Chess Openings and More Basic Chess Openings. These books were published in 1997, making them much more up-to-date with regard to ideas, plans, and strategies, and still reasonably up-to-date with regard to theory. On the whole, I like Kallai’s books very much. For the most part, he does an excellent job of identifying the various relevant lines of each opening, including not just major openings, but quite a few minor ones as well.
It does, however, have some occasional flaws. One such flaw is that there are occasions when he could have clarified the structure of the opening discussion. For example, he breaks the Najdorf into the main line and “kaleidoscope,” which essentially means “everything else all lumped together.” The result is that major main lines such as the English Attack (involving an early Be3, often followed by Qd2 and O-O-O and aggressive play) or the Classical line (involving an early Be2, often followed by O-O and more positional play), are lumped together with much less common (and in some cases, downright suspect) lines. A clearer organization, separating important lines from less important ones would probably have aided the reader more. Another flaw is that his descriptions of plans and strategies are sometimes a bit light, and have the unfortunate tendency to lapse into mere variations. One random but representative example:
Not bad, but probably not very helpful for players below class A or B.
As the above examples indicate, I’m just not totally satisfied by Kallai. As a result, I’ve been keeping an eye out for a new work that might do justice to the topic. Not surprisingly, I was very interested in Sam Collin’s Understanding the Chess Openings. The publisher’s blurb, which I quoted at the beginning of this review, certainly piqued my interest, as well as the further description of the book’s features on the back cover:
Unfortunately, these features are only inconsistently implemented. Let me address them one by one.
Main lines explained move by move. I’m not sure if by “move” they mean a single ply / half-move (e.g., 1.e4) or a move-pair (e.g., 1.e4 e5), but in either case, it’s simply not true that every “move” is explained. Usually, a line is developed for several moves to reach the defining position (e.g., 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nd2 to reach the French Tarrasch) before the first bit of explanation – fair enough. After that, the next several ply are usually explained individually, but thereafter, it’s hit and miss – some lines are explained thoroughly, others not so much. As far as the explanations themselves, sometimes they are very thorough, like Fine; other times, they lapse into mere variations, like Kallai. Ultimately, I’d say the explanations are probably aimed at the high class-B to expert level player; higher-level players will probably be bored, lower-level players will probably be confused.
Guidance against rare but dangerous sidelines. Again, this could be interpreted in a couple of ways: one possibility is that it refers to less common and potentially trappy openings such as the Latvian Gambit; another possibility is that it refers to trappy lines within mainstream openings, such as a variety of such lines that occur in the Two Knights Game. In either event, the “guidance” is very light. For example, the Latvian Gambit gets a single, short paragraph of brute variations – not very helpful. The Two Knights Game gets two-and-a-half pages, focusing on the main line and the Max Lange attack, but leaving out some tricks and traps that occur along the way, as well as some completely separate lines that can still pack a bit of a sting. On this count, I think the book fails to meet its goal in anything more than the most minimal manner.
Special emphasis on lines popular at club level. This is flatly false. Main line openings receive a great deal of coverage, whereas club openings are typically given a page or less. For example, the Torre, Barry, and Colle all share one page. The Scandinavian, an extremely popular opening amongst my Chessville friends, gets only two pages, and those are almost entirely concerned with the 2…Qxd5 variation (the 2…Nf6 variation, more popular than 2…Qxd5 at the club level as far as I can tell, is relegated to a single side note). Frankly, I think the coverage is actually better spent on the main line openings, so this isn’t a great flaw, but then I wonder why the false advertising on the back cover.
Brief descriptions of both sides’ aims at the end of each main line. Guess what? This too is hit-and-miss. Sometimes there is a decent discussion, but more often than not, variations simply end with comments such as “with a good kingside initiative” or “with mutual chances.” To be fair, this is sometimes balanced by a better discussion of plans and strategies earlier in the line, so repeating them at the end of the line would be unnecessary.
General introduction to each major opening. “Major” is a vague term – which openings count as “major,” and by what criteria? In any event, some are handled better than others. One of the best is the Nimzo-Indian. Of its slightly less than 11 pages, almost the first four are concerned with discussions of typical pawn structures, plans, and strategies. The Sicilian is also very well done: typical set-ups (e.g., the Najdorf, the Scheveningen, the Dragon, the Maroczy Bind, etc.) are identified and explained before particular lines are discussed. On the other hand, discussions of some other major openings such as the Ruy Lopez and the Semi-Slav are confined almost entirely to variations, with only a bit of prose scattered in here and there.
More than 400 diagrams. I didn’t count them, but that looks about right. I’d say there are two diagrams per page on average, in a double-column layout so as to avoid wasting space.
Finally, I come
to my conclusion. Despite my tepid comments, I think this book is more of a
success than a failure, but only just barely. It is certainly better than
Fine’s Ideas, but probably only just on par with Kallai’s books,
though with different strengths and weaknesses. Ideally, I’d say any class
A or B player would probably benefit from owning both this book and Kallai’s.
If you already have Kallai’s, then you probably don’t need to hurry to get
this one – wait until Christmas and then ask Santa for it. If you don’t
have either, then you have to decide which to get first. It’s a close call,
but I’d probably go for this one first, especially for lower level players,
as it does have more explanation on the whole than Kallai; plus, it’s one
volume instead of two, and slightly cheaper in comparison. On the other
hand, if you were to find Kallai’s books at a cheap used price, you probably
wouldn’t go horribly wrong buying them first. Frankly, as long as you steer
clear of Fine, you’ll probably be just . . . well, “fine.”
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