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Chessville
From the
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A Bland Meal One thing that has always seemed peculiar to me was that although Fischer hasn’t played a serious game in over thirty years, books still continue to fall out of the cracks about the 11th world champion. And yet, Garry Kasparov, who is arguably even stronger than Fischer (there is no disputing that he achieved a higher rating), has had precious few books written about him. Other than his match and autobiographical books, the only other book that I am aware of on Kasparov’s games is Garry Kasparov’s Fighting Chess by Kasparov, Speelman, and Wade (Henry Holt 1995).
At first I thought that Rowson was being a tad harsh, however after receiving my copy I have to say that he was spot-on. While it is obvious that Stohl put a lot of time and effort into this work, the reality is that his notes ARE dry. And while the dust jacket says: “The emphasis is on explaining the thought processes behind Kasparov’s decisions, and the principles and concepts embodied by his moves.” I didn’t find this to be the case at all. (It seems like this sort of dribble is standard fair on the back of many chess books, regardless of whether or not it happens to be true.)
When you compare this book to say, Jeremy Silman’s outstanding book on Benko, well, there is no comparison. Silman spends pages painting the reader an exciting picture regarding the details surrounding the game, as well as lots of verbal prose about why certain moves were played, whereas Stohl simply jumps straight into the moves and variations, and pretty much stays there throughout the entire book. The result is a somewhat clinical, albeit deeply researched walk through 74 of Garry’s games. The book starts with Kasparov-Muratkuliev, Baku jr team tmt. 1973, (when Garry was 10) and ends with Short – Kasparov, London Wch (8) 1993. I will tell you one feature that I really like about the book—it has a fantastic Table of Contents. Finally, somebody has listed all the important info on one page (why chess publishers find this so hard to do is beyond me). The page clearly lists: the players names, the event, the year the game was played, the name of the opening, and the page number the game can be found on. Now, is this so hard? Apparently so, because so few books do it.
Moving on, what is the deal with the layout of the Preface and Introduction? I mean, there is virtually no white space between paragraphs! It’s like each section is one long paragraph (and the introduction is 8 pages long, single spaced!). Publishers, please, please, please, remember, white space is a good thing! It breaks up the text, makes it easier on the reader’s eyes, and allows for a natural place to take a nano-second break before moving on to the writer’s next thought. Instead of trying to cram everything together as tightly as possible, spread it out, even if you have to take out one game. Trust me, nobody will notice. So, is there any reason to buy this book? Yes, if you are strictly interested in playing through some of Kasparov’s greatest games, and don’t need the verbal annotations to spice things up. Just for fun, I did a search of Big Database 2005 for the number of wins (in other words, I excluded draws and losses in my search criteria) for Kasparov, and was shocked to see he had a staggering 1455 wins! It’s a pretty safe bet that he has more high level tournament wins then any other player in the history of chess. Just to wet your appetite, I will give you one game from the book, (sans annotations) where a young Kasparov blows an even younger Ivanchuk off the board in a mere 24 moves:
24.f6! 1–0 And Garry forces mate after 24...Bxd5 25. Re8+ Bg8 26. f7. Nxf7 27. Nxf7# or 24...Nf7 25.Nxf7+ Kg8 26.Nh6+ Kf8 27.Rf7+ Ke8 28.Bxc6+ bxc6 29.fxg7 Rb8 30.g8Q# The Bottom Line If you want a collection of some of Kasparov’s best games, but don’t mind dry, bland annotations, then you will probably be content with this offering by Stohl. However, if you’re like me (and GM Rowson), you might want to wait until Kasparov comes out with My Great Predecessors Vol. 6 (Vol. 5 will cover Korchnoi and Karpov’s games), where the great champion will write about his own battles over the board.
Needless to
say, he should have plenty to say about his opponents as well as the goings
on both on and off the board at the time the games were played, and this
should make for some compelling reading. I, for one, can’t wait!
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It’s
sort of like Stohl has the technical writing part down, such as the
moves and variations, but not the “color” part. You don’t get any
feel for the importance of the games or what Kasparov’s emotions were
while he was playing the games (and if there’s one thing we know about
Garry, he wears his emotions on his face!), or anything about the place
where the game was held.
Unfortunately,
when it comes to the book’s layout, this is where my praise ends.
First of all, who picked the cover photo of Kasparov? Clearly, he
or she is a Karpov fan. They must be, why else would you show the
poor guy wearing an Izod vest with a little green alligator on it, while
grasping his head between his hands as if he were suffering from a
migraine! I mean, with all the nice suits Garry has worn to the
chess board over the years, they had to pick something that looks like a
hand-me-down from a college student?
