Status Updates From The Stories, Games, and Int...

Nottingham 1936 was a pretty strong tournament, with some crazy games by Botvinnik.

Capablanca with a nice comeback against Botvinnik in 1936 @ Moscow, and with the black pieces!

Game 25 of the 1935 WCC, kinda shows why it's maybe more reasonable to believe that Alekhine was drinking too much during the match.

It's nice to see the spotlight on some of Capablanca's later games, even if his shine got a bit dull.

Seeing Capablanca take his lumps is a bit sad, but man. Lasker! still so good!

I really enjoy the anecdote about Capablanca's sportsmanship towards Lilienthal here at Hastings.

It's impressive how different the match with Bogoljubow was for Alekhine -- you get the feeling he was just tearing Bogo apart for sport. It was no contest.

The final game of the 1927 match features a great endgame by Alekhine.

"That is how I used to play", Capablanca really turned the screws to defend so strong against Alekhine.

Game 21 where Alekhine dismantles Capablanca like this is such a treat.

after qa8... so cool

I'm surprised Alekhine's rearrangement of the pieces to fianchetto his DSB the way he did goes by uncommented on.

The position after move 17 is interesting, but even more interesting is the comparison of the commentary by Kasparov and Bronstein who disparage Capablanca, and Stockfish which agrees with him. Nevertheless, Alekhine is the more modern player here, and I think his play here shows why.

"I am ashamed of this game, but I have no hesitation in admitting that my opponent took advantage of my mistakes flawlessly." - Alekhine. It's incredible to think that this was one of the last games. Alekhine's loss with White in this game really sets the impending result of the 1927 championship in sharp relief.

Instructive endgames included, including the cool tactic in the second-given game from the Lasker-capablanca world championship match.

Alekhine's blindfold brilliancy against Bugoljubow in 1918... wow.

Lasker-Capablanca St Petersburg 1914 remains one of my favorite games of all time.

Move 22...Rd8
"Without doing anything special, Capablanca has achieved a favorable position. His b3 pawn puts pressure on White." So many times, this is what happened in Capa's games.

“Lasker paused to think, then raised an eyebrow, picked up his pen, and wrote a question mark next to his opponent’s last move. He kept thinking, and after a while, added a second question mark. Finally, he pushed his pawn to b4.”

lmao

"If two masters of the caliber of Dr. Tartakower and myself were to appraise the position as even, I would accept their opinion without the slightest hesitation."

“Sometimes, the engine leaves us with a bittersweet feeling.”

“But the Slavic master had discovered that José Raúl was human. He had dismantled the myth of the Cuban god and was ready to resist and fight at every moment.”

“While I occasionally include long variations, my general aim was to provide more words than moves, more ideas than concrete lines”.

This, I think, is off to a good start.