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Garry Kasparov is scheduled to sign copies of his "Great Predecessors Volume 2" in New York City on Wednesday, February 4. It's not at the same place as his Vol. 1 signing last summer. It's at Borders 461 Park Ave, Manhattan on February 4 at 6.30 pm. It's on the corner of 57th Street in a large complex. Many subway lines stop nearby, including the 4, 5, 6, N & R at 59th Street and Lexington.
As for the book, it is unlikely it, or any book, will attract the incredible attention that the first volume received, both positive and negative. I think it's great, but then again I try to look at it as a chess fan and not as a critic who owns over 500 other books. This remains the biggest point of contention I have with those who write things like, "And that is the main shortcoming in this book’s handling of history: too much recycled, standard, easy-to-find material, too little effort to go beyond."
That was penned by Taylor Kingston at ChessCafe.com regarding Volume 2, but it could have come from any number of reviewers about either book. He and others also talk about the "overly familiar" games in the books. Overly familiar to whom? Easy to find for whom? Talk about ivory tower! Taylor's is an informed and informative review, as are many of the others, but most seem to miss the point of the book.
I regularly cruise the chess book section at Barnes & Noble and it is not a bad one. As research I counted almost 150 titles on the shelf at the Union Square branch here in New York. Not a small number, I think you'll agree. Now then, in how many of them would you guess I would find the "easy-to-find" history and "familiar" games that appear in the Predecessors books? How many such books are even still in print and with distribution beyond chess shops and online purchase? (Offline purchasing of books is still 50-to-1 over online.)
The Kasparov books were the only ones at B&N you could consider history. No other book on the shelf would tell you about Steinitz or Botvinnik beyond a passing reference. "Developments of Chess Style" by Euwe/Nunn wasn't there. "The Guinness Book of Chess Grandmasters" by Hartston isn't available. The Oxford Companion is long out of print. Sometimes you see the great old algebraic "500 Master Games of Chess" by Tartakover and Dumont, but the analysis is very outdated and little historical data is included. (The common "Idiot's Guide.." and "Dummies" primer books actually do include some basic history, so that contradicts my point somewhat.)
So unless you spend a lot of time shopping around for new and used chess books online you are unlikely to be familiar with these classic games, let alone the old analysis and biographical information. Simply learning about the existence and chronology of the champions is no easy task. While I think the addition of Kasparov's analysis and perspective makes the Predecessors books essential for even the most seasoned collector, we need to recognize that the book is not exclusively for experts despite the complexity of Kasparov's analysis in some cases.
Not to say that "there isn't anything similar easily available" is an argument for the quality of a book, of course. But it should be kept in mind by those who have a rather broad definition of "easily available sources." I'll ask again: which famous/important/influential games do you leave out of a book like this so you can include lesser-known gems?
Many writers seem to define their role purely as critic and not reviewer. Few make mention of anything they enjoyed and instead catalog what they define as errors or flaws. Other than historical facts and analysis improvements, what makes for a flaw is quite subjective. Which is fine, but acting like you were aware of this would be nice.
Most are historically minded and are oblivious to how impossible it would be, and irresponsible in many cases, for Kasparov and Plisetsky to engage in the epic speculation that fills the days and nights of many chess writers and historians. Kasparov feels obliged to acknowledge speculation in a few cases, and gives his opinions, but for reasons of length and legitimacy it would be inappropriate to pursue these things too far in the Predecessors books.
As with any author, any person for that matter, some things attract Kasparov's eye more than others. Length is also an issue, so things have to be prioritized, some things given little space, some things left out entirely. It's fine to criticize when you feel something lesser has been included at the expense of something important, but at the end of the day this is preference and the only solution is to write your own book.
I'm coming up for air after doing the daily round reports and analysis on Corus Wijk aan Zee for ChessBase.com for the past few weeks. Argh. So much analysis only to show a a couple of diagrams and lines, but you don't want to miss any of the decisive moments. That's always embarrassing. Is this where I can yet again tell my story about showing a win that Short and Radjabov missed in analysis of Radjabov-Anand, Linares 2003? It was in my report the same day of the game, for goodness sake. A few days later Short gives an erroneous draw in his Sunday Telegraph column. A few weeks later Radjabov himself gives the same nonexistent draw in New In Chess. Months later GM Krasenkow writes in to New In Chess to say some students of his found 'this amazing win for Black" blah blah. Same thing I gave the day of the blooming game. But I'm not bitter.
I think even GMs are so dependent on computers these days that many of them don't really know how to use them for analysis. They scroll through the moves expecting a few second to illuminate the secrets. This isn't true even in very tactical positions. I find out more things because I often use Fritz and Co. to explain to me why my ideas don't work. On rare occasions they DO work and it's something the machine would have needed a long time to find on its own. After I use Fritz to auto-check games for blunders I always have to spend a few minutes going through the score to remove some of the silly evaluations it gives. Trust them for most tactics, and you have to love endgame tablebases, but it's not going to revolutionize chess looking each move of a super-GM game for five seconds.
This is what drives me crazy about kibitzing live games at Playchess.com, and it's no better on other chess servers. Having 800 amateurs shouting about how Anand and Kramnik are "blundering" because their moves are rated -0.34 worse than what their chess engine wants to play. This is a joke. Unless the eval drop is more than a full pawn (1.00) after a good five minutes of computer time, skip it!
Here's an experiment you can try that proves my point. Take a handful of super-GM classical games. Have Fritz auto-annotated them with the analysis threshold at 60, so it will only add variations if it thinks its suggestion is that much better (over half a pawn) than what was played in the game. Give it five or ten seconds per move. When it's done, have it do the same games again but with one or two minutes per move, or even more if you can let it run overnight.
The result? The more time you give it the LESS analysis it adds. That is, Fritz comes around to agreeing with the GMs instead of finding more so-called mistakes. Viva la humanidad!
You know how the trailer for a new movie often turns out to be better than the movie? They take all the funniest jokes and best special effects and put them into a one or two-minute clip to suck you in. Then you go see it and it just sucks, period. That you've already seen the best bits doesn't help.
In a documentary about chess you don't get many special effects or jokes, so the trailer is likely to be a pretty good guide to the movie. If that's the case, start lining up now for tickets to "Game Over: Kasparov versus the Machine." It's about to be released (Friday, January 23rd) in theaters in the UK and the new trailer is out and on the web. It's incredibly cool.
The film's producer sent me three links directly to the streaming media files (.asx format) for different connection speeds. Pick the one that works for you. The file should launch in Windows Media Player.
Broadband • high speed • low speed
I was interviewed extensively for the film but only appear for a minute or two, which makes sense no matter how cute I am since I wasn't one of the pricipals. (It wasn't until the third time I watched the trailer that I noticed it's my voice at the start saying "here comes this 17-year-old..." Funny how you can't recognize your own voice. Skull vibrations, so they say.) Members of Kasparov's team and the Deep Blue team are interviewed, and of course Kasparov gets a lot of screen time. The film isn't as dramatic as the trailer, of course, but we both know you'll see it anyway. Probably twice.
There's no date for release in the US yet and negotiations are still up in the air.
The American cable channel A&E is releasing a television movie Fall 2004, on inner-city kids who play chess and revitalize their school lives. No doubt more than loosely based on the many success stories from dedicated coaches like GM Maurice Ashley in Harlem. Speaking of, Disney has optioned "I Choose to Stay," the 2003 book by Salome Thomas-EL who used chess as a tool to inspire inner-city schoolkids in Philadelphia. There have been many such films in recent years, not all of them with soundtracks by Coolio, but chess is new ingredient to the usual "tough kids with hearts (and minds) of gold" Hollywood line. (Stand and Deliver comes to mind.)
The US Championship is forming slowly but surely. The field is 64 players, up from 56 in 2003. There will be 16 women and 48 men in the nine-round Swiss and a stunning $250,000 prize fund, still the largest in the world. The top six men and the top five women on the February, 2004 USCF rating list are automatically seeded into the Championship. Then you have the junior champion and the former champions. The rest are from the many qualifying events, usually the top opens. Players pay $75 pre-event to be eligible for qualification. This turns out to have become quite a nice earner for the championship as dozens of players in each event have paid the fee despite only a handful of slots being available. The qualification system adds many new (and hungry) faces to the usual suspects every year.
Mentioned in this brief interview with US Champion Alexander Shabalov is that he plans to begin work on a book. "I want to write something entertaining about modern tournament life, the life of a tournament player."
Chess anecdote books have been out of fashion since the Chernev-Horowitz heyday three decades ago. I'm sure the light-hearted Shabalov is a fine candidate to pen one, although of course he'll be expected to fill most of the book with his exciting games and analysis.
Through insider sources I've been keeping tabs on the best-selling chess books at one of America's largest online and offline booksellers. (No, not just checking their popularity rankings online, which vary dramatically due to complex and rigged formulas.) "Chess for Dummies" outsells the rest, with the classic "Bobby Fischer Teaches Chess" close behind. Both of these outsold the new Kasparov "My Great Predecessors" book if you take the average of its first few months of availability. Of course the massive "Predecessors" hardback costs two to four times as much as the others.
There has been a great deal of conjecture over which chess book is the best selling of all time, with most plumping for "Fischer Teaches..." That would certainly seem to be fair claim based on how well it still sells. Chess historian Edward Winter has discussed the various claims in his Chess Notes column (ChessCafe.com) and compilations.
The top chess books far outsell the top bridge books. On the other hand, the top-selling non-fiction book, "The South Beach Diet," sells 250 times the top chess book, "Dummies." The good news is that the Dummies book, by Jim Eade, is an excellent primer. Even better is GM Patrick Wolff's book "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Chess". Put decorative paper dust-jackets on them if you're embarrassed to read them on the bus.
World #7 Alexander Morozevich has dropped out of Corus Wijk aan Zee with the flu. He will be replaced by #6, Veselin Topalov. If Morozevich dropping out of supertournament sounds familiar, you have a good memory. The Russian star was hotter than hot in 1998 and everyone was looking forward to seeing how his dynamic, unorthodox style would do in a supertournament. He was scheduled to play in Dos Hermanas in 1999, but bowed out at the last second.
As I wrote in Mig on Chess #114 way back then: "World number five Alexander Morozevich of Russia has bowed out of the Dos Hermanas tournament at the last minute due to illness and will be replaced by Belorussian Boris Gelfand. This is a great disappointment to all of us who were eager to see the young Russian tested against the world's best after a year of amazing results. Expectations had been high so maybe nerves had an effect on the wispy lad's immune system? Whatever it is it seemed to come on fast because Morozevich had already arrived in Dos Hermanas!"
Moro is one of many top players to claim retirement in the past few years, while playing just as many games. Mostly they seem to do this to protest the decline in big-money invitations and the loss of the FIDE KO in the past two years. That's it, guys. When the going gets tough, the tough, umm, whine and say they're going to retire.
Topalov has stronger claims on inactivity. He played in many rapid events in 2003, but his only classical games of the last year were back in the last edition of Corus in January.