My Chess Career

by José Raúl Capablanca

The seminal work of the Cuban genius who repeated the exploits of Morphy, suddenly bursting onto the European scene and annihilating the great masters who had hitherto dominated the international arena. This book captures the magic of Capablanca's early victory at San Sebastian 1911 and his second place - bowing only to Lasker - at St Petersburg 1914. All in all, 35 games are annotated by Capablanca in person with remarkable objectivity - bestowing praise and hurling criticism as and when required.

Genres: Chess, Nonfiction

194 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1920

About the author

World chess champion from 1921-1927.
One of the best players of all time.
His skill in the endgame and his speed of play garner special praise.

Reviews

[Eddy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty cool little book, a classic. Written by a man who, before the coming of Fischer, was considered the greatest chess player of all time. It’s probably more suited to players above 1500, perhaps higher than 1600. Capablanca doesn’t explain most of his moves. He assumes a certain level of proficiency in his audience, and leaves the reader to figure out much for themselves. In fact, he doesn’t always give complete game scores, when he deems the game completely won. This is something that even a stronger player will find annoying. Nevertheless, the games are quite pleasurable to play through, and there’s much instruction in many of the notes. Capa gives generally short variations, and devotes most of his instruction to insight, something I personally find appealing. The only rub is that the descriptive notation used is a little cumbersome at times, especially in the notes, which are shown as a string of moves and not in a column, as in the game. It can get a little confusing to follow without a board; and although I’m familiar with DN, I found myself sometimes mistaken and having to replay the moves in several games. Capa offers some interesting, sometimes humorous and even fascinating anecdotes about his life prior to becoming world champion. It’s a pity the legendary Cuban didn’t write more books, as he was a wonderful teacher. Capablanca made everything seem easy.

[Isaac Clemente ríos · Rating 5 out of 5]

Capablanca selecciona y comenta las partidas que mejor representan la evolución de su carrera ajedrecística.

Recomendable leer con el chessbase abierto para comparar su análisis con lo que dicen los módulos.

Una maravilla.

[Morris Nelms · Rating 5 out of 5]

Capablanca is my favorite chess player and writer on the subject. He says things in such a compact way that some readers are taken aback. He's been accused of being shallow and/or egotistical. I don't see either. He was one of the best ever at this game; he knew it, and everyone else knew it. He tells us how he got there.
You don't ever 'read' a chess book, but this one I did read all of it like a memoir. I still have to go back and study the games, which is true of any book on chess. You are never finished with the information in them.

[D Warner · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this book for a narrative about the life of Capablabca and an insight into his development as a chess player. That is delivered in this book to some extent;although the bulk of the text is dedicated to analysis of actual games throughout Capablanca’s career. This analysis was not incredibly helpful to me as a beginning player but I do plan to go back through the book and actually play these games.

[Tim Reisner · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rather pleasing games collection featuring 50 of JRC's best games, some annotated by Alekhine.

This edition 1994, with intro by Lev Alburt, published by Grandmasters Publishing.

[Cody Oldham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great games, I enjoyed the annotations as well capa is a different kind of guy.

[Lu N · Rating 5 out of 5]

he llorado

[Serge Pierro · Rating 3 out of 5]

Capablanca goes over 35 of his games in this book - a year before he becomes world champion. The games are nnotated and instructional, Capablanca displays his "clean, simple" approach to the game.