Learn From the Grandmasters: New Algebraic Edition

by Mikhail Tal, Viktor Korchnoi, Jan Timman

Each of the chess grandmasters featured in this new edition has selected two games for one that he has found instructive and one of his own. An excellent manual, reset in algebraic notation, and updated with contributions by leading players of the 1990s.

Beginner

Genres: Chess

160 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1975

About the author

Mikhail Nekhemyevich Tal (Latvian: Mihails Tāls; Russian: Михаил Нехемьевич Таль (1936 – 1992), was a Soviet Latvian chess player and the eighth World Chess Champion.

Михаил Нехемьевич Таль (латыш. Mihails 9 ноября 1936, Рига — 27 июня 1992, Москва) — советский и латвийский шахматист, гроссмейстер (1957), восьмой чемпион мира по шахматам (1960–1961). По образованию филолог.

Reviews

[TrumanCoyote]

If memory serves, the first edition was better than this one, which suffers from a distinct case of Keenitis. Of course there was no way that Raymundo was ever gonna sidestep the opportunity to be a contributor and merely act as editor to this affair, but in addition to his typically overblown chapter we are greeted with the spectacle of several others making rather fawning references to St Ray (including Hodgson pointing out that Keene was for a time in a class all by himself in England...while failing to mention that they didn't have a GM just yet). :D

[TrumanCoyote]

The Tal chapter alone is well worth the price of admission here. But we also get Korchnoi's words of wisdom, and most of the other guys' offerings are quite compelling. I still well remember (after having read this for the first time many years ago) Tal's account of his loss against Nezhmetinov and Gufeld's amazing defeat against Kavalek (The Immortal Bishop Vs 2 Rooks Game!). On the down side, Kurajica pounded on his chest a little bit--although not anywhere near as bad as Larsen, who dismissed his win against Fischer as "almost too easy" and actually said at one point: "Here I lost all respect for my opponent." A line which only Keene was lame enough to also use (in his execrable account of the Nice 1974 Olympiad...quite possibly the worst chess book I've ever encountered). And btw who was this idiot who Larsen found fit to scorn? Gheorghiu. lol (Seriously, get bent, Bent.) Speaking of Keene, unfortunately he too has a chapter, but not even that could tarnish the luster of this small but weighty tome. An unlikely one-shot knockoff anthology with a wealth of different styles and viewpoints, unlike anything else I've seen, and which is to this day one of the best chess books I've read.