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Chessville
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Chess for Children Reviewed by Rick Kennedy
When I received Chandler and Milligan’s Chess for Children to review, I realized that chess literature today is a far sight different than it was when I was first learning to push pawns. Back when Morphy and I were still in knickers (ok, ok, maybe Bobby is a better choice), my Chess the Easy Way, by Fine, was a helpful book, but easy it was not. I still remember Horowitz’s Chess for Beginners, because it had photos of the chessboard and pieces (as well as diagrams) to illustrate positions. This review called for a little research, so I strolled through a couple of my favorite book stores, and then popped into a few of the local libraries. It was easy to find 20 books to bring home – I would have had at least half-again as many, if I had flashed my VISA card along with my library card. The first thing I learned was that there is no standard size for a child’s or beginner’s chess book, and that they can be either softcover, hardcover, or hardcover with a dust jacket. They also vary quite a bit in what they present and how many pages they run – for example the older The Guide to Chess (1995), by Malcolm Pein, the recent Pandolfini’s Ultimate Guide to Chess (2003) by Bruce Pandolfini, and the just-released A World Champion's Guide to Chess (2005), by Susan Polgar, all run to nearly 400 pages. These three are comprehensive – Pein covers the rules, tactics, the opening, the middlegame and the endgame and still has room for a brief history of chess, desert island chess, and a chapter on “So You Want to be A Grandmaster?” – and seem to be aimed at the older student (late middle-school or high school) or the older beginner. Children’s books can also be very focused: David MacEnulty has written The Chess Kid’s Book of Tactics (2003), The Chess Kid’s Book of Checkmate (2004) and even The Chess Kid’s Book of the King and Pawn Endgame (2003). Supposedly he aims for the 6 to 10 year-old group, but my guess is that those must be pretty well-focused (or well-coached) elementary school students. Many children’s chess books are apparently designed to make chess appear not-scary. You know: chess is a fun game, boys and girls, not just the pastime of geeks, nerds and brainiacs. So Nigel Short’s Chess Basics (1994), Rosalyn Katz’s Start Playing Chess (1996), and Michael Basman’s Chess for Kids (2001), for example, all have just chess pieces on the cover. David King’s Chess: From First Moves to Checkmate (2000) goes over the top with shiny metal pieces of futuristic design that show up throughout the book and reflect all sorts of interesting distorted images. Ted Nottingham, Bob Wade & Al Lawrence’s Chess for Children (1993) takes the cake with a cover featuring chess pieces, a board – and a glass of milk and chocolate chip cookies! It also contains chess-focused short-short stories, poems, and of course plenty of pictures of kids playing chess. Once a world of black ink and white pages, introductory chess books are more and more filed with more and more color. An earlier example, Raymond Keene’s Chess for Absolute Beginners (1993), features red & white chess diagrams which are, frankly, hard on the eyes; while the newer Checkmate - My First Chess Book (2004) from Garry Kasparov is awash in many different hues. Most books, such as Harriet Castor’s whimsical Starting Chess (1995), use color to brighten up the presentation, and to direct and/or segregate attention to different parts of the page. Perhaps it’s the influence of television, or even Sesame Street, but many beginners’ chess books these days seem to have very “busy” pages. Check out Brine Pritchard’s The Right Way to Play Chess (1950) and you can march your eyes up and down the page from the top of the Introduction to the bottom of the Index, without distraction. Check out newer works, and you’ll bounce from text to photo to illustration (each with captions) to pull quote to sidebar to game notation. This is not just “kid stuff,” either. Ken Whyld’s very pleasant Learn Chess in a Weekend (1993) – which features the silver-pated author serenely playing a game against a pensive Cathy Forbes on the cover – appears aimed at older beginners, yet it has a (well-organized) visual smorgasbord within. Finally almost all of the books I looked at were written by accomplished chess players or coaches.
Now, back to Chess for Children, an 8 ½ by 11 inches hardcover book with 112 pages, a black & white interior and a colored cover featuring a drawing of a smiling boy playing chess with a friendly alligator (while a cute mouse looks on), written by a Grandmaster and a Women’s International Master. Chess for Children can be seen as a “prequel” to Chandler’s quite successful How to Beat Your Dad at Chess (1998) and its follow-up, Chess Tactics for Kids (2003). It takes the novice from learning the moves of the pieces, through understanding and using chess notation, on into the ideas of draw and checkmate. Attention is paid to castling, pawn promotion, capturing en passant, and stalemate. Basic tactical ideas are presented, and some basic checkmates and simple endgame mates (K+Q vs K, K+R+Q vs K, K+R+R vs K) are illustrated. Finally, there are a few quick looks at how games are begun, and some helpful hints for opening, middlegame and endgame play. Running through the book – illustrated with humorous drawings – is the tale of Kirsty, alleged Grand Alligator of chess (and teller of some tall tales), teaching young George how to play the Royal Game. Readers can measure their learning of different aspects of chess, and their progress toward the skill level of Grand Alligator, by taking seventeen different “Terribly Tough Tests” placed throughout the material (the answers can be found in the back of the book). The final chapter features a game between Kirsty and George, where the latter uncorks “the super-duper hyper-advanced ultra-accelerated Dragon system,” something that does not seem to appear in ACO (Alligator Chess Openings). Chess for Children should appeal to older elementary school children who want to simply learn to play chess, or somewhat younger ones who can work through the book with a parent or older sibling. Compared to some of the other titles mentioned above, the book’s layout is relatively un-busy. Its focus is not to give an artist’s rendition of pawn-as-footsoldier, or present thumbnail sketches of past World Champions, or show kids playing chess on the playground. It is designed to teach the moves of chess – without a frown, but with a smile. The book’s philosophy can be read on the back cover:
PS: I promised myself I wouldn’t get through this review without mentioning Piers Harper’s hilarious Checkmate at Chess City (2000) – hardcover, 10 inches by 12 inches, about 25 pages with lots of color. It does a barely adequate job of teaching how the chess pieces move, and little more, but its concept is incredibly kid-friendly, especially in this video game age:
Chess for Children, then, is a first step toward the quite attainable goal of what is often referred to as “chess for fun.” When it comes to fun, there is nothing quite like beating a grown-up at a grown-up game! If chess is still enjoyable some time later, and the child wishes to go further, there are, as I’ve noted, plenty of books around to follow up with. (As always, check the library first.) Established toddler Grandmasters, U6 World Champions, and elementary school chess team hitmen will likely find Chess for Children too basic – “been there, won that” – and they will need to look elsewhere. Or maybe that’s where they started…
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