| Book Reviews by IM John Donaldson : Two from Gligoric The great Yugoslavian Grandmaster Svetozar Gligoric is well-known to English speaking chess fans of the 1960s and 70s for his popular column "The Game of the Month" which appeared in Chess Life and Review. In this column he managed to find a fine balance between clear explanation, concrete analysis and interesting anecdotes. He has succeeded again with his latest two books, I Play against Pieces (2002, 288 pages, figurine algebraic notation, paperback, 15.99 English Pounds) and Kings Indian Defense: Mar Del Plata Variation (2002, 160 pages, figurine algebraic notation, paperback, 13.99 English Pounds) , both published by Batsford (www.batsford.com). I Play against Pieces is a model of what a game collection should be with 130 well-annotated games, a tremendous amount of autobiographical material and a special chapter covering Gligoric�s considerable contributions to open theory . Those with a knowledge of Russian or Serbo-Croatian have some inkling of what a treat is in store for them, but individuals whose only tongue is English, and have been forced to make do with the Chess of Gligoric (1972) by David Levy and Svetozar Gligoric: Collected Games (1987) by Colin Leach, have a real treat in store. It�s not that those books were bad, but rather than this one is so good. Gligoric was a Candidate for the World Championship and the top player in Yugoslavia for over three decades. During this time he faced all the top players in the world and he writes about these experiences in I Play against Pieces. Particularly interesting to my mind are his accounts of the annual "Friends and Rivals" series between Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. Routinely Gligoric would turn in plus scores in these competitions while all of his teammates would be minus! If you want to learn how to play 1.d4 as White, the Kings Indian (later the Tarrasch) and King�s Indian as Black, this book is like a primer. Gligoric played these systems throughout his life and contributed extensively to their development. One of the best ways of learning an opening is by playing over high quality, well-annotated examples. This book provides plenty of them I Play against Pieces is ably translated by the husband and wife team of Zoran and Biljana Ilic and handsomely produced with eight pages of high quality black and white photos. I strongly recommend this book to all chess players. Kings Indian Defense: Mar Del Plata Variation refers specifically to the line 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.Nf3 0-0 6.Be2 e5 7.0-0 Nc6 8.d5 Ne7 9.Ne1 Nd7 where Black follows up with �f5, �Nf6, �f4, �Ng6 and the now routine maneuver � Rf8-f7-g7 in conjunction with �Bf8. This economical way of guarding the weak points on d6 and c7 while furthering the preparation of an attack with �g4 is now automatic, but it wasn�t always so as Gligoric points out. He takes the reader on a historical journey back to the early 1950s and shows how he first came up with the idea and how it evolved. Besides passing along plenty of King�s Indian wisdom Gligoric also finds time to bring alive chess from half century ago. We learn from him how slowly chess information was passed along in those days. That Taimanov, facing Najdorf at the Interzonal in Zurich , several months after the Mar Del Plata, had no knowledge of Gligoric�s important discovery that had yielded him wins against Najdorf and Eliskases. Oh wouldn�t Garry Kasparov like to go back to those golden times where novelties could win several points! Kings Indian Defense: Mar Del Plata Variation covers not only 9.Ne1, but also 9.Nd2, 9.Bd2, 9.Bg5 and of course the very popular 9.b4. The material is presented via 38 well-annotated games with plenty of diagrams to help the reader orient himself. The latest game featured is Bacrot-Motylev, Linares 2001. This book is recommended for all players that play either side of the Classical Kings Indian. |