300 Most Important Chess Positions

A Book Review

If you follow Chess Skills, then you know that I've been working through Thomas Engqvist, 300 Most Important Chess Positions (2018) at a pace far more accelerated than recommended by the author. When I announced this 60 day effort in December, I noted, “failure may be expected”. I worked through the last four positions this morning, the 74th day.

I heartily recommend this book. Studying five positions per week, as the author suggests, improves retention, and likely long-term benefits from study. Having raced through the book, I will be reviewing and deepening my study of many positions in the book over the coming months.

Engqvist’s 300 positions are selected from classical games, recent master practice, and compositions. Engqvist also includes some of his own most instructive losses. He is guided by a library of chess books, many years of playing, and experience coaching. The core idea of deep study of a limited number of positions developed from the way he was coached by Robert Danielsson while a young player. He studied positions from Ludek Pachman’s books on the middlegame and endgame.

Alekhine builds his gun

In the introduction, Engqvist makes a case for careful, disciplined study and focus on a limited number of positions per week. This contrasts markedly with Jeremy Silman's recollection that as a young chess player, he went through "200 to 500 games a day, every day" ("Studying Master Games and Berkmaster's First Over-the-Board Tournament Battle"). Silman claims that he absorbed tactical patterns and positional concepts in this manner. Engqvist advocates reflection and review with intent to "understand, grasp and assimilate the most important idea(s)" (9). He asserts that studying too many positions at once lead you to forget what you have learned. At the core of this learning process, he writes, is "to gain a deeper appreciation of the inner qualities of the pieces, their movements and their actual value in any specific position" (emphasis in original, 9).

By way of illustration, he offers this composition by Paul Rudolf von Bilguer from 1843.

White to move

This position appears in the introduction and as number 281 in the text. Both Ludek Pachman and André Chéron advocate 1.Qe6 and consider the position a draw, but tablebases show that it is a win. There is much to attempt to absorb in the tablebase moves that Engqvist annotates (274-276), but he notes that sometimes the queen works best when it does no more than a rook can do (9). 1.Qc7! is the only winning move. The queen's demotion explains the first move, but subsequent moves draw on the full mobility of the queen, leading Engqvist to marvel at "how the attacker uses the queen over practically the whole board" (276).

The positions that he chooses are interesting, challenging, instructive, and practical. Most of them were tested with chess players who subscribed to an email course where they were presented five positions per week. Rarely is a single move or short sequence the solution that one must find while examining the position. Only a few offer long computer solutions as in the Bilguer study. A considerable number of positions feature equal or near equal positions from games where strong moves and persistent maneuvers eventually provoked error.

Many of the positions are suitable for training with a study partner. Engqvist recommends playing both sides with another person, or against the computer. Teaching the position to someone else improves retention he notes, and in my experience also depth of understanding. My young students often vex me with moves that were not anticipated in master commentary or computer analysis. The positions in this book are excellent resources for coaches. The day that I acquired this book in February 2019, I took it to a lesson with my top student. We looked at six endgames and then the first position in the book (see "A New Book and a Morphy Game"). The next few weeks, this student and I will be playing some of the rook and queen endings.

Emphasis is on positional concepts, rather than tactical operations. The author notes that this emphasis distinguishes his book from Lev Alburt, Chess Training Pocket Book: 300 Most Important Positions and Ideas (1997), which emphasizes tactics. Alburt also limits the number of endgames. He states that becoming a "strong player" requires knowledge of 12 key pawn endings, not hundreds (9). These 12 are in his Pocket Book. Alburt's book is the second one that I list in "Ten Books to Achieve 1800+".

Some positions in 300 Most Important Chess Positions are surprising, such as White’s second move in the English Opening, Sicilian Reversed.

White to move

But this position is placed alongside others (both English Opening and Sicilian Defense) with references to several games played by top players. There is plenty of study material in these games. I might also note that Engqvist’s opening choices reflected in the positions chosen offer more variety than those in another collection of 300 positions that I’ve spent time working through: Rashid Ziyatdinov, GM-RAM: Essential Grandmaster Knowledge (2000). Ziyatdinov’s positions stem from games where 1.e4 is the overwhelming choice.

An instructive sequence of positions that I found highly motivating began with Bologan,V.--Frolov,A., Moscow 1991, a Sicilian Defense, then in a variation continued with Anand,V.--Illescas Cordoba,M., Linares 1992 and reference to Karpov,A.--Kasparov,G., Moscow 1985.  It continued with Bologan--Frolov for two more positions, then Marin,M.--Korneev,O., Capo d'Orso 2008 takes us through moves 2-4 through three positions in the English Opening, Sicilian Reversed.

The first position in the book is slightly less surprising, but with two book moves played by Adolf Anderssen and Paul Morphy, as well as many other players before and since, Engqvist’s preference for Morphy’s choice provokes reflection.

White to move

9.Nc3 and 9.d5 both get played by masters today. Adolf Anderssen favored 9.d5 and won many games from this position. Paul Morphy showed, Engqvist suggests, that 9.Nc3 is a better developing move.

As I consider Morphy’s 9.Nc3 in the Evans Gambit or Mihai Marin’s view that after 1.c4 e5, 2.g3 is the most precise, I am reminded of my tendency to blitz out opening moves by rote and only begin thinking after an inaccuracy. Engqvist’s positions from very early in the game should help me to develop better habits. Thinking should begin before the first move, even if positions at move 10 are well-studied.

There are positions in this book that I have used with students for many years and there are positions that are wholly new to me. There are many positions with several pages of analysis and variations. There are positions that should be drawn, but one player was able to present sufficient difficulties to provoke error.

Ziyatdinov advocates memorizing the 56 games from which he draws the middlegame positions; Engqvist is more selective in games that he suggests the student commit to memory. Schulten -- Morphy, New York 1857, a King's Gambit that Morphy won in 21 moves, appears in both and I'm close to having it in my long-term memory. I have not yet started the effort to memorize Karpov,A.--Unzicker,W., Nice 1974, which is another suggestion of Engqvist's.

One position that I studied in early January led me to improve my move order in a position that I frequently reach while playing against the Caro-Kann.

Several endgame positions that I played against Stockfish before or after reading Engqvist's notes drove me to dig into some of the volumes in Yuri Averbakh's eight-volume series.

Engqvist's analysis is fresh, lucid, and thought-provoking. Many of his memorable phrases guide me when they should--appropriate moments during play. For example, "Nimzowitsch tried to make his opponent tired and careless by doing nothing" (230). In Duras -- Nimzowitsch, San Sebastian 1912, more than twenty moves of rooks and kings were played in a completely equal endgame. Only when Duras erred did Nimzowitsch move a pawn.

I reflected on this lesson while playing online a completely drawn ending of bishop and knight versus bishop, and then nine moves prior to a draw by the 50-move rule, my opponent allowed a small combination that allowed me to win his bishop. That game, then, became my first opportunity to checkmate with bishop and knight that did not result from a deliberate underpromotion. Because of Engqvist's choice of positions, I had recently practiced that checkmate, too (see "Recognizing Known Positions").

300 Most Important Chess Positions was on my shelf nearly six years, serving as occasional study material and reference for finding positions suitable for some of my students. Now that I've been through every position, I will use it more actively.

I have a to do list that developed as I was going through the book. The list includes studying Jose Capablanca's analysis of a couple of his games in My Chess Career (1920), the only Capablanca authored book that I did not wholly read in 2021. Engqvist brought to my attention a game that Richard Reti analyzes in Master of the Chessboard (1930), which I intend to study. Some of Engqvist's analysis draws from Victor Bologan, Victor Bologan: Selected Games 1985-2004 (2007), and I added it to my library. The long rook endgames and queen endings are games worth reviewing periodically until I absorb their lessons.

Another task presented to me after racing through this book is that Engqvist has also published 300 Most Important Tactical Chess Positions (2020), 300 Most Important Chess Exercises (2022), and Chess Lessons from a Champion Coach (2023). Any or all of these books would be worth my time. Perhaps I'll continue to ignore Engqvist's advice on pacing, and race through his tactics book in the near future.

Principle of Development

The first task of a chess player at the beginning of a game is rapid development. This means that a player should deploy the maximum number of pieces on squares where they are not vulnerable and work together with other pieces. They should be deployed with attention to the opponent's efforts to accomplish the same.

There are other ways to define the principle of development (see "What is Development"). The paragraph above is an effort to present the essence of the oldest definition of the principle that I have found in print. That definition is a translation of writing by Domenico Lorenzo Ponziani (although credited to Ercole del Rio by the translator). It was published in English 17 years before Paul Morphy was born (see "Principle of Development: Early History").

Morphy is usually credited as the "first player to understand the importance of swift development in open games", as Thomas Engqvist puts it in 300 Most Important Chess Positions (2018), 13. Engqvist offers 30 key positions from 24 games to articulate the concept of development in practical ways (13-32). There should be no question that Morphy's games illustrate well the principle of rapid development. They also show, as Engqvist elucidates well, how to sacrifice material to gain a decisive advantage against a player who neglects the principle.

I have spent that past ten days working through these 30 key positions as part of an effort to read the whole of Engqvist's book in 60 days (see "60 Days, 300 Positions: Day One"). This morning I reviewed all thirty positions after spending some time (too little) on numbers 26-30. I noted the key ideas that Engqvist offers through these positions, questioning how much was absent from Ponziani's articulation of the principle.

Engqvist includes center control, which I do not see in Ponziani's statement. He also shows Morphy's preference for avoiding "unproductive one-move threats" (14). Some of the most challenging positions in the first section of the book feature positions from modern grandmaster practice where the idea is to interfere with the opponent's harmonious development. The translation of Ponziani states, 

Whoever, at the beginning, has brought out his Pieces with greater symmetry, relatively to the adverse situation, may thence promise himself a fortunate issue in the prosecution of the battle.
J.S. Bingham, The Incomparable Game of Chess (1820), 32.

In the context, I suspect that harmony might make more sense than the word symmetry, but I have not examined Ponziani's Italian. Nonetheless, it is clear that the notion of attentiveness to the opponent's development exists in Ponziani's formulation.

William Steinitz is often credited with articulating the principles underneath Morphy's play. But, clearly other chess writers before Steinitz mentioned the principle of development. As for Morphy being the first to understand rapid development, I offer this position, which would be in my collection of 300 most important positions.

White to move

White has already sacrificed two pawns and here often plays 10.Qb3, sacrificing a rook for a winning attack. Black's best chance is 10...d5 11.Bxd5 O-O, as was played in Meyer,H. -- Ubbens,MH., 1926. Gioachino Greco is credited with the position and has both 10...Bxd4 and 10...Bxa1 for Black. In fact, Greco copied this position from the manuscripts of Giulio Cesare Polerio, or perhaps a book by Alessandro Salvio (see "Greco Attack Before Greco").

Searching ChessBase Mega 2024 for the position turns up nine games with 10.Qb3 prior to the first with 10.Ba3, which might be an improvement (see "Corte -- Bolbochan 1946").

After 10...Bxa1 in Polerio's composition, we have a position that I like to show students in conjunction with this position from Morphy's Opera Game.

White to move

In both cases, White is behind a considerable amount of material but completely winning because Black's pieces lack mobility. It seems clear to me that Polerio and to an even greater extent Greco understood the pitfalls in neglecting the principle of development. It remained for the leading players of the so-called Italian school a century later to articulate the principle.

Nonetheless, Morphy's games remain the clearest early examples.

60 Days, 300 Positions: Day Two

Thomas Engqvist urges review as an integral aspect of the process of learning 300 chess positions. Today, I reviewed the first five positions in 300 Most Important Chess Positions (2018). Three of these appear among those in Rashid Ziyatdinov, GM-RAM: Essential Grandmaster Knowledge (2000), a book I labored part-way through more than a decade ago.

All five positions are derived from four games played by Paul Morphy. One, from a game against his father, is a position I had not studied prior to working through the first part of the book in February 2019, although I have a position from the game in my collection of exercises for students, Checkmates and Tactics (2019).

As noted yesterday, I wrote about the first position in the book shortly after it arrived in the mail. I noted there that two moves—both played by Morphy at different times—differ only slightly in their merits, but Morphy’s move in the reference game has been the dominant choice of masters. As both moves are playable, judgement is necessary. Engqvist’s observation that “one should avoid unproductive one-move threats” (14) is worth reviewing.

Positions 4 and 5 both derive from Schulten — Morphy, New York 1857, game 7 in GM-RAM. I have memories of attempting to imitate Morphy’s play in this game against a student in a blitz or rapid event a week or two after we had studied the game together. I remember his laugh as we found ourselves in the same opening. He won the tournament, but I won that game. Morphy’s play inspired my plans, but my young student avoided Schulten’s errors. That student achieved an expert rating as a high school student when he won the Spokane Falls Open in August 2019.

Both Engqvist and Ziyatdinov urged memorizing this game. Engqvist writes, “learn this model game by heart” (16). I had it lodged in my short-term memory when I was working through it with Ziyatdinov’s book about the time that I studied it with my young student, but I cannot completely reconstruct it from memory this morning.

Schulten, J. — Morphy, P.
New York 1857

1.e4 e5 2.f4 d5 3.exd5 e4!

I recall studying the opening stats and learning that 3…exf4 appears to score better. Nonetheless, I nearly always play 3…e4 here. I have had the position after 3.exd5 at least 426 times in online play. Black has won five games more than White. I've been White more often as the King's Gambit is an opening I play with some regularity. The first time that I played 3...e4 was in 2007 in a 15 minute game with a three second increment. I won in 45 moves.

My recollection of the game begins to falter here. I remember the next move, but with some uncertainty.

4.Nc3 Nf6

At first, I wrote Bb4 without sight of the board. I corrected the notation after checking the game score in 300 Most Important Chess Positions.

5.d3 Bb4

Of course, the timing of the bishop move is important, as here it pins the knight.

6.Bd2

Black to move

This is position 4 in Engqvist’s book. It does not appear in Ziyatdinov as a key position.

6…e3!

I played 6...exd3 in that 2007 game, which preceded my study of Morphy's game. I played 6...e3 for the first time in 2016. winning that game in 48 moves.

7.Bxe3 O-O 8.Bxd2 Bxc3

I still struggle with Morphy’s choice here, as it is not clear to me how the exchange of bishop for knight implements the principle of development.

9.bxc3

Why not Bxc3? This was the move played against me in 2016. According to the engines, bxc3 appears slightly better that capturing with the bishop.

9…Re8+ 10.Be2

This game is one of several Morphy games that merit study because of his effective use of pins. When my memory of this game gets me to point, I always remember Morphy’s moves when I’m able to recall Schulten’s.

10…Bg4 11.c4

Would Schulten have been better off here with 11.Nf3? Stockfish 16 favors 11.Kf2.

Black to move

Position number 5 in Engqvist is position number 150 in Ziyatdinov.

11…c6! 12.dxc6??

I identified this move as Schulten’s critical error when I first studied this game in detail, and capturing this pawn was one of my own errors in one of the worst tournament games I have played (see "Knowing Better"). In that game, my opponent played 3...c6!? and things went downhill quickly for me.

12…Nxc6-+ 13.Kf1

This position is number 151 in Ziyatdinov and I had it once doing tactics training on Chess.com.

13…Rxe2!

Morphy’s exchange sacrifice that maintains one of the pins on e2 is reminiscent of the Opera Game.

14.Nxe2 Nd4 15.Qb1

It is difficult to find a move for Schulten here that makes sense. The position is resignable. 

15…Bxe2+ 16.Kf2 Ng4+ 17.Kg1

Black to move

Morphy has a forced mate in seven.

17...Nf3+ 18.gxf3 Qd4+ 19.Kg2 Qf2+ 20.Kh3 Qxf3 21.Kh4

Philip W. Sergeant, Morphy's Games of Chess (1957 [1916]), 229 ends the game score here, giving the moves to mate as a comment. Other books and some databases carry the game all the way to mate.

Both 21...Nh6 and 21...Ne3 finish the job. My students rarely find 21...Nh6 and then 22.h3 Nf5+ 23.Kg5 Qh5#.

Ten Books to Achieve 1800+

Having seen many lists of top ten chess books recommended for players at different levels, I thought it time to reflect on how books contributed to my rise from C Class to A Class. My first non-provisional rating was 1425 when I was in my mid-30s. I played chess competitively many years earlier, but no events were rated. In the late-1970s, I had a USCF correspondence rating. But when I returned to active play after graduate school, the USCF had lost the records of my postal chess.

I rejoined the Spokane Chess Club in late 1995 and played in my first rated OTB event in March 1996. In October, I played my sixth event and no longer had a provisional rating. By the end of the year, my rating had risen to 1495, but would not rise above that point until 2002. I remained in C Class until fall 2006. While on this plateau, I was gaining both knowledge and skills, but rating progress was slow. Too much online blitz may have held me back.

My journey from wholly ignorant beginner in the late-1960s, to competitive high school player in the late-1970s, to active C Class club member in the mid-1990s involved a lot of book study. Further progress from C Class in my 30s to high A Class in my early 50s included many books, active play, private lessons, chess videos, and I also started coaching elementary students in 2000.

It is no easy matter to choose ten books. By the time I reached A Class, I owned close to 300 chess books and there are very few I had not spent some time reading. At the same time, there are also very few that I read wholly. Some books, or my manner of reading them, may have held me back (just as hundreds of three minute blitz games every month may not have helped me).

The Ten

In November 1996, I played in the Washington Class in Federal Way. There was a book seller set up in one of the rooms near the playing hall. I spent a bit of time there talking with David Weinstock, owner of ChessMate. In our discussions, he recommended a book to me. I was skeptical. The title sounded more basic than my own self-assessment of my needs. Nonetheless, when I found the book at Auntie’s Bookstore when I was back in Spokane, I bought it and started to read it. It was transformative.

Consider my list of ten, pictured above and described below, as a provisional suggestion rooted in experience. What worked for me may or may not work for you. Read all recommendations with skepticism, but also with openness to trying something that might help. There are no magic books guaranteed to improve your chess, but only a few will fail to teach you something of value.

1) Georges Renaud, and Victor Kahn, The Art of the Checkmate (1953) was the book David suggested, and is my first recommendation. Having spent many hours in the 1970s learning the basic checkmates with heavy pieces and even two bishops, and having delivered many fine checkmates in many games, it was hard to believe there was much I could learn from such a book. Reading it, however, exposed me to new checkmate patterns, including some that I had seen, but not absorbed, from a book I studied in 1975: Irving Chernev, The 1000 Best Short Games of Chess (1955). Renaud and Kahn not only taught me new patterns, but they gave me a framework for thinking about checkmate and checkmate threats.

As David Weinstock had, I began to recommend The Art of the Checkmate to any and all who would listen, and also to many who ignore what I say. I still do. This book helped me, and it can help you. But there are other books that could substitute, and might be even better. Victor Henkin, 1000 Checkmate Combinations (2011) takes a slightly different approach. It also teaches an abundance of vital checkmate patterns and greatly exceeds Renaud and Kahn in the amount of study material. Antonio Gude, Fundamental Checkmates (2016) is another option. It is comprehensive and to an extent combines the approaches of Henkin with that of Renaud and Kahn. One can find dozens of other books on checkmate patterns, but these three stand above the others. Get one of them, or even all three.

Vital

2) For a year or longer, Lev Alburt, Chess Training Pocket Book: 300 Most Important Positions and Ideas, 2nd ed. (2000) was my bedside reading. I read it cover-to-cover twice. Alburt’s book was the only tactics book I finished prior to early 2023 when I finished all 1320 exercises in Sergey Ivashchenko, The Manual of Chess Combinations (1999). It is not an ordinary tactics book for practicing basic ideas, but rather, a small set of carefully chosen positions with tactical and positional concepts. It also has a small number of vital endgame positions.

Many grandiose claims have been made by different authors about the legendary 300 positions, but there should be no doubt that careful and deliberate study of a small number of carefully selected positions will take your game up a notch. Alburt’s book helped me. A few years after completing it, I began study of another book focused on 300 carefully selected positions: Rashid Ziyatdinev, GM-RAM: Essential Grandmaster Knowledge (2000). More recently, Thomas Engqvist has gained my attention, now with a trilogy of books containing 300 in the title.

An Idea Worth Considering

3) Quantity matters, too, when it comes to tactics training. A classic that has lifted the skills of generations of chess players has also been part of my training. Fred Reinfeld, 1001 Winning Chess Sacrifices and Combinations (1955) deserves a place in every chess player’s library. In 2008, I spent quite a bit of time playing these positions against the computer. Often I could find the tactic, achieve a clearly superior position, and yet still fail to defeat HIARCS (see "Where the Rubber Meets the Road"). Reinfeld organizes the chapters by themes—forks, pins, double attacks, and so on. I set my database containing these positions to open randomly so I did not know which theme to look for. But I also use the book, either solving from the diagrams or sometimes setting up the positions on a board.

Endgames have been vital to my success. In 2007-2008, I invested a lot of time teaching some elementary rook endings to my top student, the strongest third grader in my city. That summer, in the Spokane City Championship, I played two rook endings against FM David Sprenkle, drawing one game.

Currently, I’m on a collector’s quest to have 64 endgame texts in my personal library. The quest stems from my enjoyment studying positions with few pieces, my conviction that endgame knowledge is vital for all skill levels, and my involvement in an online community of book lovers, Chess Book Collectors on Facebook. During my rise from the 1500s in 2002 to high-1900s in 2012, much time was invested in endgame study.

4) The endgame book that did the most for me was Mark Dvoretsky, Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual (2003). As one of ten books to recommend to class players, Dvoretsky is a controversial choice. Many players find it too difficult for anyone below master. Poppycock! Chess books are not novels. One does not read every word. Read the part that makes sense and push through a bit that stretches and challenges you. I have read the long chapter on pawn endings in Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual several times and have flash cards containing the 48 blue diagrams that I use for review, study, and teaching (see "Pawn Endings Flash Cards"). I’ve struggled through perhaps half of the chapter on rook endings and made flash cards for the first 24 blue diagrams. Other chapters I have dipped into from time-to-time.

During the years spent studying Dvoretsky’s Endgame Manual, other books have also supplemented my work. These include, Bruce Pandolfini, Pandolfini’s Endgame Course (1988); Jeremy Silman, Silman’s Complete Endgame Course (2007); Karsten Müller and Frank Lamprecht, Fundamental Chess Endings (2001); and several others. My top recommendation for those looking to begin endgame study is Yury Averbakh, Chess Endings: Essential Knowledge (1993). There are many choices. Choose that one that you like, but do not neglect the endgame. Make endgame study a priority if you want to play better chess.

Splurge

5) Jacob Aagard, Excelling at Technical Chess (2004) also concerns the endgame. However, it is distinct from the endgame manuals listed above. The core of the book focuses on “seven technical tools”—schematic thinking, weaknesses, domination, do not hurry, passed pawns, how to arrange your pawns, and freaky aspects. Aagaard develops each of these ideas with compelling prose and detailed game analysis. As he states in the beginning, this book follows an approach that has made Mikhail Shereshevsky, Endgame Strategy so highly regarded. The technical tools are worthy of detailed attention, and I hope to find time to explore them in more detail. I blazed through this book is a couple of days, reading all the prose and glancing superficially at the game analysis. However, this superficial reading was enough to transform my game. My endgame play became more resilient. Formerly, I would often offer or accept a draw in seemingly equal positions. After reading the book, I play out most positions to the end, often lone kings. If there is any reason to play on—an imbalance, a weakness of any sort in my opponent’s position, even a better king position—a draw is anathema unless it secures a tournament victory.

Annotated games have always been a regular part of my chess study. In my youth, I spent many hours playing through games from three GM tournaments that resulted in books that I purchased: San Antonio, 1972; Leningrad, 1973 (the 42nd Soviet Championship); and Wijk aan Zee, 1975. In addition, I bought and still have two books by David Levy that were collections of games by specific players: Karpov’s Collected Games: All 530 Available Encounters, 1961-1974 (1975); and Gligoric’s Best Games, 1945-1970 (1972). All these books influenced my play as a teenager as I sought to imitate the play of the world’s elite.

6) In my 40s, I had many more chess books to choose from and studied annotated games from many of them. One source of such games that I returned to frequently is Garry Kasparov, My Great Predecessors, 5 vols. (2003-2006). Kasparov culls some of the best insights from many years of chess literature and presents many of the most important games of every world champion before him, as well as many contenders for that title who fell short. Chess history offers a reliable foundation for the development of chess skill. Although Kasparov does a poor job of documenting his sources (see my Patriots and Peoples blog for examples of sourcing problems in the writing of US history), the series remains an important practical overview of chess history.

7) Paul Morphy’s games are particularly useful to chess players who want to play well. Perhaps one day I will be able to report that I have played through every one of his available games. So far, I have been through at least one-third of them, some of them many times. His eighteen tournament games have been imposed by me on some two dozen students, who have been through all of them. I’ve shown the Opera game to students at least one hundred times and of course know it fully. For insights into Morphy’s play, few books are in league with Valeri Beim, Paul Morphy: A Modern Perspective (2005). This book has enriched my study.

8) Chess Informant was long the indispensable source for current master games from before I took up the game in the 1960s into the twenty-first century. Now, of course, these games are readily available from many sources. In 1996, as I was coming back to chess with some seriousness of purpose, I was curious about Informant, which I had seen only in the USCF sales catalog. At the Washington Class, however, David Weinstock had some on the table. He allowed me to look at them and we talked about how they were organized. A month or so later, I included Informant 64 in an order of books from USCF sales. It aided my correspondence play in a concrete way (see "Playing by the Book"). More importantly, learning the Informant system of codes changed my thought processes during play. There are so many things that one contemplates during a chess game while looking for the right moves or the correct plan. Sometimes these thoughts are noise that interferes with clear focus on what matters. To an extent, the limited analytical possibilities in the Informant codes distills chess down to things that really matter in the quest for advantage.

As I grew as a player, Chess Informant was a useful tool. Today’s Informants are changing with the information explosion and are oriented more towards the needs of class players than they were in the past. Give them a try.

A Growing Collection

Of course, I did not rise from C Class to strong A Class without studying the works of Jeremy Silman. His endgame book is already listed above, although it was less useful to me than Dvoretsky. In fact, the day I bought it, I read everything through the section on B Class, finding very little that I did not know. Silman’s endgame book has done more for my teaching than for my own progress as a player. That’s plenty! His writing is compelling and many of his metaphors and personal anecdotes are unforgettable.

I bought and read (partly, of course) How to Reassess Your Chess, 3rd. ed. (1993); The Reassess Your Chess Workbook: How to Master Chess Imbalances (2001); The Amateur’s Mind: Turning Chess Misconceptions into Chess Mastery, 2nd ed. (1999); and The Complete Book of Strategy: Grandmaster Techniques from A to Z (1998). When it finally came out, I added How to Reassess Your Chess: Chess Mastery through Chess Imbalances, 4th ed. (2010), but my rating had risen above 1800 before then.

9) Of these books, Reassess Your Chess and the companion workbook were most useful in helping centralize imbalances in my thinking. When I need to win a tournament game, seeking imbalances from the very first move often proves vital.

The Complete Book of Strategy did nothing for my game and very little for my teaching. Its usefulness has been so slight that I struggle to show proper supportive enthusiasm when a young student has shown me that they just acquired it. I must remind myself that there is a difference between this book’s presence in a chess library of more than 400 volumes that includes several dictionaries and encyclopedias, and a chess library for which this book is the first book acquired. It is a good book, even though it does not meet my needs.

What about the Opening?

In high school, I spent many hours studying lines in I. A. Horowitz, Chess Openings: Theory and Practice (1964). In the 1990s, Walter Korn, and Nick DeFirmian, eds. Modern Chess Openings, 13th ed. (1990) took its place. Even more time was spent on opening monographs, including several on two related variations of the Sicilian Defense that feature an early e5 push by Black. There is some evidence this study hurt my game, or at least retarded my improvement. I tried to memorize lines and often faltered when my opponents deviated from the lines that I knew.

Use at Your Own Risk

In 2003, I began to switch from the Sicilian to the French as my primary defense against 1.e4. The French Defense is not superior to the Sicilian. It might even be a worse choice, but for me it marked a shift in how I approached opening study. Rather than grinding through lines in a book, I sought understanding of the principles, of basic concepts, such as one finds articulated clearly in José Capablanca, Chess Fundamentals (1921), of the ideas behind the moves. Unquestionably, I learned many lines, but when my opponents deviated from these, I was prepared. My play improved.

Detailed opening study and learning concrete lines has aided my preparation for specific opponents in several cases. At a crucial moment while still a B Class player, I won the Spokane Contender’s tournament, earning a shot at the title of Spokane City Champion. Expectations of victory were nearly non-existent. No one expected a B Class player rated in the 1730s to prevail over FM David Sprenkle, rated in the 2250s, down considerably from his peak. As preparation, I spent close to 40 hours on two semi-obscure variations: the Raphael variation against the Dutch Defense for when I had the White pieces, and a seemingly risky Nh6 idea for Black in the French Advance. It took Sprenkle 72 moves to compel my resignation in the French, and I drew my second game with White. It was a very good day.

Most of the time in tournament play, however, such extensive opening preparation is more of a crap shoot. Unless an opponent walks into your pet line, where is the benefit? Tactics win and lose games. Endgames keep chances alive as players grow weary or hungry.

10) Hence, my tenth recommended book is one that I’ve read very little, but that exemplifies how I have come to believe opening study should be pursued. Reuben Fine, The Ideas Behind the Chess Openings (1943) is out of date in terms of the line presented, as should be expected. But, players of the French Defense well-know that White’s pawn on d4 is always a target. The Sicilian Defense is always grounded in creating pawn imbalances and active piece play in the quest for equality and even winning chances.

Other Books

Many other books helped me in my successful quest to reach A Class, and remain there for fourteen years so far, as well as my quest to rise into Expert Class, falling just short and less a goal in my 60s than it was in my mid-50s. Learning drives me. My knowledge continues to grow even as my performance in competition is less consistent.

Decisive Advantage

My students this week are seeing a series of positions in which White has a decisive advantage. Before suggesting moves, or seeing those that were played, I ask them to assess the position. What features account for White's substantial advantage?

The intent is for them to grow in their understanding that a player must use all their pieces in coordination. They should notice that in each position, White's pieces are more mobile, offer concrete threats, and work together. Students are also asked to understand the difference between the pieces on the board and the pieces in the battle. This dynamic imbalance is temporary unless the player wit the advantage acts with vigor.

I spent about an hour gathering 16 positions for these lessons, but no student so far has seen more than eight. The first two are from famous games that many of the students have seen before.

The first is from Paul Morphy's Opera Game.

White to move

The second is from Gioachino Greco's best known use of the Greco Attack (see "Cultivating Error"). I have had this position myself in at least 17 games, winning 16. The one loss was a bullet game where I inexplicably put a horse on a square earmarked for an elephant.

White to move

The third position highlights the relationship between space and mobility. It comes from a game that I played on Chess.com a few days ago.

White to move

Number four was presented at "Desperation". It highlights concrete checkmate threats. Number five is a textbook endgame exercise.

White to move

The sixth proves difficult for students to assess. It comes from a cyborg game played in a match organized by the International Correspondence Chess Association (ICCF). In this game, White used his intuition and a great deal of time on moves 13-15 to acquire mobile center pawns that confer a dynamic advantage.

White to move

Thomas Engqvist's analysis of Morphy,P. -- Morphy,A., New Orleans 1849 in 300 Most Important Chess Positions (2018) guided my selection of the seventh position (14-15).

White to move

Rook and Bishop Checkmate

Lesson of the Week

Most of my students this week are receiving instruction in checkmate patterns employing rook and bishop. Most of the exercises feature a queen sacrifice to expose the king. I have drawn several positions from Victor Henkin, 1000 Checkmate Combinations, trans. Jimmy Adams and Sarah Hurst (2022) and several more from Georges Renaud and Victor Kahn, The Art of the Checkmate, trans. Jimmy Adams (2015). I also culled some positions from databases. For discussion of these books, see "Learning Checkmate (Or Teaching It)" and "Two Old Books (and one new)".

This position is published in my own Checkmates and Tactics (2019).

White to move. Mate in three.

This mate in five has stymied many of the students.

White to move

This mate in three is easier.

White to move

Morphy's famous queen sacrifice against Louis Paulsen in 1857 leads a series of imitators offered in Renaud and Kahn, The Art of the Checkmate.

Black to move

Samuel Boden followed Morphy's example to get a winning attack with multiple checkmate threats from this position.

Black to move

In all, I prepared 18 positions, but no students have seen them all. Some of my younger beginners received a worksheet with three mate in one and three mate in two.

This position was on a worksheet for older or more advanced students in my after school chess club. It comes from a game I played against Crafty on the Chessimo iPad app.

White to move

How many can you solve?

Howard Staunton

On the Origin of Good Moves Reading Log*

In The Chess-Player's Handbook (1847), Howard Staunton asserts, "in chess, as in modern warfare, one of the most important strategems is the art of gaining time upon the enemy" (48-49). This assertion could well be considered central to the foundation of the articulation of positional chess, but Staunton does not get such credit.

Time served as a "factor" in Siegbert Tarrasch's articulation of what many have taken to be a continuation of William Steinitz's modern theory. He stated, "Force, Space and Time work together at every move" (The Game of Chess [1935], 231). Later, pawn structure was added to Tarrasch's formulation, and these became the essence of "development" (see "Principle of Development: Early History"). These were the factors that I learned in my youth, and then found anew as I was returning to chess after about a decade of minimal play, and read some of Yasser Seirawan's exceptional "Winning" series published by Microsoft Press in the 1990s. I recall Wesley So telling Seirawan during one of the Wijk aan Zee broadcasts that these texts gave him his foundation.

Time remains vital to Dan Heisman's nearly iconoclastic Elements of Positional Evaluation, rev. ed. (1999), where he lists mobility, flexibility, vulnerability, center control, piece coordination, time, and speed. Heisman considers notions of space, pawn structure, and development as "pseudo-elements". In Heisman's brief synopsis of the history of positional theory, he claims that after Andre Danican Philidor, the next contribution to theory was the play of Paul Morphy, skipping over Staunton.

Who mentions time prior to Staunton? Research might reveal that it was Giaochino Greco, although I cannot point to a passage in his manuscripts where this is the case. I do vaguely recall the concept articulated in some annotations by William Lewis, and Staunton was certainly familiar with the works of Lewis. Following this assertion concerning time, Staunton suggests the relevance of the art of warfare for chess with reference to Traité de Grand Tactique (1805) by Antoine-Henri Jomini, who served under Napoleon as well as other leadership capacities elsewhere in Europe. Staunton's lessons from Jomini, the art of war:

...consisted in the proper application of three combinations--first, the art of disposing the lines of operation in the most advantageous manner; secondly, in a skillful concentration of the forces with the greatest possible rapidity upon the most important point of the enemy's line of operations; and thirdly, that of combining the simultaneous employment of this accumulated force upon the position in which it is directed. (49)

Staunton implies that the application of these principles of war to the game of chess ought to be self-explanatory. Perhaps this failure of elaboration is what excludes him from narratives of the development of chess theory. But, if so, why does Steinitz get so much credit? The Modern Chess Instructor (1889) is even more paltry in its elaboration of principles of positional play.

Willy Hendriks, On the Origin of Good Moves (2020) does not elevate Staunton's reputation as a theorist in his short chapter, which concentrates on the second match between Staunton and Pierre de Saint-Amant (76-88). He does, however, claim that Staunton's contribution to the development of chess skill among those who followed him were manifested in three ways. The first is the role of newspaper columns.

In the quiz that begins the chapter, Hendriks presents this position and an intriguing question.

White to move

His question is derived from a challenge that Staunton offered to his opponent in a battle of analysis in chess periodicals, Le Palamède edited by Saint-Amant and Chess Player’s Chronicle by Staunton. Would you be willing to take the Black side in a series of six games? How much would you be willing to bet on the outcome?

Saint-Amant asserted that Black has an attack and a clearly superior position. Staunton disagreed. Staunton did lose the game, but Hendriks suggests that his loss was due to a subsequent tactical adventure that led no where.

Edward Winter wrote about the controversy in "Staunton v. Saint-Amant", Chess Notes 5709 (10 August 2008). This article forms the source for annotations to this game in ChessBase Mega2020. Hendriks develops his narrative of the word wars through the work of Nick Pope at Chess Archaeology. The emergence of chess columns in newspapers, and then specialized chess magazines, in the first half of the nineteenth century, Hendriks asserts, began to improve the level of chess skill. Staunton's Chess Player's Chronicle is prominent among them, as was Le Palamède. Staunton's second contribution is found in his books. Then, in 1851, Staunton organized the first international chess tournament.

Hendriks core argument in the chapter disputes an assertion of Harry Golombek that the quality of play in the Staunton -- Saint-Amant matches was "much superior" to the McDonnell -- De Labourdonnais matches (77). Hendriks shows that there was an abundance of errors in the latter, as there had been the previous decade when the top French player met the top British player.

Hendriks' exercises at the start of the chapter and his analysis of the games from which they were derived sent me into the databases to play through with some rapidity all 27 games from the two matches. To be honest, I found that exercise to be a chore. Aside from a few interesting endgames, the play of neither gentleman inspired me. On the Origin of Good Moves extracts the most interesting moments. My criticism of the chapter is that Hendriks only vaguely references the fact that the match he focused on was the second between the two men. His assertions that Staunton was clearly the superior player should not overlook Saint-Amant's victory in the much shorter first match.

*See "On the Origin: Reading Journal".

Beating Your Dad at Chess

Game of the Week

My exercise set for the Knight Award has this position.

White to move

It is the exercise that my students find most difficult among the dozen in that set. The position arose in a game Paul Morphy played against his father when he was twelve years old.

An earlier position from this game appears as the third position in Thomas Engqvist, 300 Most Important Chess Positions (2018).

White to move

In the game, Paul Morphy's father, Alonzo, made several errors. Maybe he was not a very strong chess player. Maybe he sought to help build his son's confidence. Young Paul's moves are not in every case the first choice of today's engines, but his overall play demonstrates that already at the age of twelve, he understood the importance of rapid mobilization of his pieces and was not afraid to sacrifice material to exploit a vulnerable king.

Morphy,Paul C -- Morphy,Alonzo [C51]
New Orleans, 1849

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.b4 Bxb4 5.c3 Bc5 6.d4 exd4 7.cxd4

7.0–0 became a common reply in the 1860s. Both moves score well for White.

7...Bb6

7...Bb4+ is possible

8.0–0

Black to move

8...Na5

The elder Morphy neglects development, but as his son is usually credited with discovering the importance of development, our judgement should not be too harsh.

8...d6 would have been better.

9.Bd3 d5

Opening the e-file cannot be good for Black. The king's vulnerability will create the conditions for young Paul to show the skills that would become his signature.

9...Ne7;
9...d6

10.exd5 Qxd5

Father seems determined to help his son.

10...Ne7 11.Ba3 0–0 12.Qc2

11.Ba3 Be6 12.Nc3 Qd7

See Engqvist's position above.

13.d5!

Morphy understood that material does not matter when Black's king is vulnerable.

13... Bxd5

13...0–0–0 14.Qc2 (14.dxe6 Qxd3 15.exf7 Nf6 16.Be7)

14.Nxd5

My main line while looking at the position in Engqvist's book was 14.Bb5 c6 15.Re1+ Be6. I had not yet recognized the game as the source for my exercise.

14...Qxd5

White to move

15.Bb5+

Engines like 15.Re1+ Kd8 16.Be4 Qd7 (16...Nf6 avoids checkmate) 17.Qxd7+ Kxd7 18.Rad1+ Kc8 19.Bf5+ Kb8 20.Re8#

15...Qxb5 16.Re1+ Ne7 17.Rb1

Much better is 17.Rxe7+ Kf8 18.Ne5.

17...Qa6

This move offers White a forced checkmate.

17...Qd7 18.Rxe7+ Qxe7 19.Bxe7 Kxe7 White still has a decisive edge, but has much work remaining after his relatively weak move 17.

White to move

18.Rxe7+ Kf8 19.Qd5

There is a faster checkmate, but it is hard to fault Morphy for pursuing a checkmate in two that can be delayed through spite checks.

19.Rxf7+ Kxf7 20.Qd7+ Kf6 21.Be7+ Kg6 22.Qe6+ Kh5 23.g4#

19...Qc4

See my position for the Knight Award at the top of this post.

19...Bxf2+ delays the end with spite checks.

20.Rxf7+ Kg8 21.Rf8# 1–0

I beat my dad when I played him at age fifteen, but my play lacked the sort of combinations that Morphy displayed. No record was made of the game (see "My First Chess Book").

A New Book and a Morphy Game

Initial Impressions Towards a Review

My copy of Thomas Engqvist, 300 Most Important Chess Positions (2018) arrived last Friday less than an hour before a lesson with one of my students. I took the book with me. Inasmuch as the first lesson each month is devoted to the endgame, we worked through the first several endings (positions 151-155) in Engqvist's book after finishing the materials I had prepared for the session. We also looked at position 194, which caught my eye while flipping through the book because I had seen a similar problem last week.

After the lesson with my student, I read the front matter and looked at position number 1 in the book. This position is from Morphy -- Stanley, 1857, which I have been studying the past few days.

White to move

The correct move in this exercise is a matter of judgement. Many strong players have played the "wrong" move. Engqvist mentions Adolf Anderssen, but he could have noted that Morphy also played it several times in the two years after the game where he played the "correct" move. Morphy's "discovery" (14), however, has been the overwhelming choice of masters in this somewhat infrequent position (512 games in my database with a 63% score for White).

I can count on my fingers the number of books in my chess library that offer exercises where the correct answer is debatable. I think that is a testament to the value of this book. At first glance, 300 Most Important Chess Positions offers prospects for developing positional understanding.

Charles H. Stanley was one of four players to defeat Paul Morphy without odds in New York in 1857. Morphy, however, may have had the Black pieces more than his share in their games. Among the extant games between these two players, this game is the only one when Morphy had White.

Morphy,Paul -- Stanley,Charles Henry [C51]
New York, 1857

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.b4 Bxb4 5.c3 Ba5 6.d4 exd4

6...d6 is hot

7.0–0

7.Qb3 Qf6 8.0–0 Bb6 9.e5 is another possibility.

7...d6

Black could try 7...Nge7 8.Ng5 Ne5 9.Nxf7 Nxf7 10.Bxf7+ Kxf7 11.Qh5+ g6 12.Qxa5.

8.cxd4 Bb6

See diagram above.

9.Nc3

Engqvist offers the diagram. Under the diagram, he offers the moves leading to the position and Morphy's move. He highlights Morphy's importance historically in a few sentences, then mentions center control and time as White's temporary advantages in this position.

It's more important to develop pieces instead of making useless short-term attacking or defensive moves. In other words one should avoid unproductive one-move threats and instead concentrate on long-term gains.
Engqvist, 14

One-move threats are certainly how I cultivate losing streaks in online blitz at least once every week.

9.d5 White has scored well. This move has been played by De Labourdonnais, Anderssen, Morphy, and others with good results. Engqvist calls this move "superficial" (14).

I think that this first position has instructive value. Engqvist says that he uses it with his students, and I think it is worthy of addition to my stock of lessons as well. Although the alternative to his "correct" move is playable, the lesson is clear. I could have stopped here and moved on to the next position, but I found Morphy's game interesting.

9...Nf6

Was this move the decisive error?

9...Na5 seems best. Engqvist suggests that he lets his students play the game out from the position before 9.Nc3. Students can try Anderssen's approach, and they can avoid Stanley's reply.

10.e5

My database shows eight games with this move and eight wins for White. Stockfish 10 says White has a clear advantage.

10.Bg5 h6 11.Bxf6 Qxf6 12.e5 dxe5 13.Nxe5 Nxe5 14.dxe5 Qh4 was won by Black in 67 moves, De Labourdonnais,L -- McDonnell,A London 1834.

10...dxe5 11.Ba3 Bxd4

11...Nxd4 12.Nxe5 Be6 gives Black a slight edge, according to Hiarcs 12, but Stockfish 10 sees it as a decisive advantage for White.

12.Qb3

Black to move

This position is reminiscent of several of Greco's games.

12...Be6

And now +6 in favor of White.

After 12...Qd7 Fritz 11 considers the position equal, but Stockfish 10 has White with a winning advantage.

13.Bxe6 fxe6 14.Qxe6+ Ne7 15.Nxd4 exd4 16.Rfe1

Black to move

16...Nfg8

16...dxc3 17.Rad1 (17.Qxe7+? Qxe7 18.Rxe7+ Kd8 19.Rd1+ Kc8 White may have compensation for the pawns) 17...Nd7 (17...Nfd5 18.Rxd5) 18.Bxe7 Qc8 19.Bd6+ Kd8 20.Qe7#.

17.Nd5 Qd7 18.Bxe7

18.Qxd7+ Kxd7 19.Nxe7 Nxe7 20.Rxe7+ is given as better by Géza Maróczy in his book on Morphy. I do not have this book, but the annotations appear in David Levy and Kevin O'Connell, Oxford Encyclopedia of Chess Games, vol. 1 1485-1866 (1981).

18...Qxe6 19.Rxe6 Kd7 20.Rae1 Re8 21.R6e4 c6

White to move

22.Rxd4 cxd5 23.Rxd5+ Kc6 24.Rd6+ Kc7 25.Rc1+ Kb8 26.Bh4! Nh6

White to move

27.Bg3 Ka8

27...Nf5 28.Rd8#

28.h3 Nf5 29.Rd7 g6 30.Rcc7 Nxg3 31.fxg3 Rb8

The rook ending is instructive.

White to move

32.Rxh7 Rxh7 33.Rxh7 a5 34.h4 Rg8

34...b5 35.h5 g5 (35...gxh5 36.Rxh5 a4 37.g4 b4 38.Ra5+ Kb7 39.Rxa4) 36.Rg7 b4 37.Rxg5 a4 38.Ra5+ Kb7 39.Rxa4

35.g4 b5 36.h5 a4 37.h6 b4 38.Rg7 Rh8 39.h7 b3

White to move

40.Rg8+ Kb7 41.Rxh8 b2 42.Rb8+ Kxb8 43.h8Q+ 1–0

Although Morphy had a clear advantage after Black's ninth move, his play through the whole game offers useful instruction in how to use the initiative to bring home the full point.

Possibilities

This afternoon was my after school chess club for beginners. "Beginners" in the context of my two after school clubs at the same school references a lack of successful tournament experience. Once a student has scored three points in a five round scholastic tournament, he or she is eligible for the advanced club. That is the standard for qualifying for our state championship, an event that draws one thousand or more elementary children together each spring.

The plan for today was to present them with worksheets from my Essential Tactics set. Essential Tactics are 150 simple exercises with ten pieces or fewer. I composed 130 or so, and a few others are standard endgame positions one finds in many textbooks, a Paul Morphy composition, and one clearly derived from Paul Morphy's composition. These 150 exercises are available at Amazon in two forms: Essential Tactics: The Worksheets (2017) presents the 25 worksheets that I use with my students in reproducible form (permission is granted to purchasers), and Essential Tactics: Building a Foundation for Chess Skill (2017) offers the same exercises with solutions in Kindle Reader format.

When I arrived at school, I made photocopies of worksheets 5-10. Some of the students wanted number six, others chose number five. I also wanted to present a simple tactical exercise on the demo board, but did not prepare one beforehand. On the drive to school, I remembered a blitz game that I played this morning and what seemed like a simple tactic to reach a drawn position. However, once I set it up on the demo board, it became clear that my opponent missed a clear win. The more I looked at the game before and after my intended "instructive position", the more interesting it became.

White to move

The game continued 49.Bb2+ Kd5 50.Bxe5 Kxe5 51.Kc3 and the position is clearly drawn although we played out to move 63 before I was able to claim a draw by repetition.

That simple sequence would have been fine for my beginning students, except that both players blundered on move 49, and Black also had a much better move 48 that wins easily.

If we back up a few moves, we find a position that should result in a draw, although Black has an extra pawn.

White to move

45.Kb3

An error, according to engine analysis, but it seems not yet a fatal one. After 45.Bf4, White has demonstrated the idea to keep the Black king from penetrating and the passed pawn from advancing.

45...Bb6 46.Bc1 Bc7 47.Bd2

White understands the importance of e3 as an entry point for the Black king.

47...f4

White to move

48.Bc1??

The bishop is well placed, White needed to move his king.

48...Be5

Now, we have the first position in this post.

Black could have played 48...d2 and after 49.Bxd2 Kd3 50.Bc1 Ke2, Black has an easy win.

49.Bb2?? Kd5??

49...Ke3 wins. 50.Bxe5 d2 51.Kc2 Ke2 and the pawn promotes.

The game continued as above.

I showed the students the skewer and what happened, then tried to elucidate the possibilities of what might have happened.