| December 2002 Book Reviews by John Donaldson Secrets of Chess Intuition (Gambit, 2002, 176 pages, figurine algebraic, $19.95) by Alexander Beliavsky and Adrian Mikhalchisin touches upon a subject that is quite controversial amongst top players. I remember listening to Arthur Bisguier analyzing a game and hearing him remark that he always played the first move that came to mind. That, when he was younger, he often would come up with a move instantly, then spend ten or fifteen minutes trying to analyze more deeply into the position and finally end up playing the first move that had come immediately to mind. As he got older he said he learned to trust his intuition more, but exactly what chess intuition is, is not so clear, as the authors explain in their introduction. The difficulties involved in defining exactly what chess intuition is are perhaps best explained by the following exchange between one of the wise foxes of modern chess and the late trainer of Anatoly Karpov. In the opinion of the Dutch Grandmaster Genna Sosonko: �Behind the word �intuition� lies our subconscious experience or knowledge of games and ideas, either our own or those of others. When I showed my games to the great Semion Furman, he asked, �Where did you get that idea from?� to which I replied, �I thought it up myself.� Semion then said, �No, you must have seen this before��� Furman�s observation is very much to the point. How much of our play is truly original and what percentage is based on previous examples that we have studied. The problem, of course, is that often we don�t consciously remember the examples that have been burned into our chess hard drive. This point is made by one of Poland�s first Grandmasters. �Polish Grandmaster Wlodzimierz Schmidt described intuition as �subconscious knowledge�. Again, one could spend hours deliberating how to interpret this, but the fact of the matter is, that understanding in some people develops much more quickly than in others.� The topic of subconscious knowledge could be tied in with subconscious calculation. How many times have we seen a game played by an intuitive player in which afterward all the variations hold up to scrutiny? The answer, according to GM Alex Yermolinsky, which is not directly covered in this book, is subconscious calculation. If this sounds somewhat metaphysical, the fact that some players can take one idea and apply it to another ten analogous positions seemingly instantly, while others take minutes, or even hours, to make the connection, is quite well known. I know from personal experience how Yasser Seirawan often makes connections between two seemingly dissimilar positions, almost instantaneously. The challenge for Secrets of Chess Intuition is how to convey this skill to the reader. The two authors have divided the material into nineteen chapters including The Intuition of Mikhail Tal, Which Rook?, Intuition and Risk and Intuition and the Opening. At the end of the book, there is a chapter entitled Test Your Intuition in which the student is given 22 positions to solve. Beliavsky and Mikhalchisin deserve credit for writing a pioneering work on a very difficult subject. I don�t expect this book to be the last word on chess intuition or its closely related cousin, chess pattern recognition, but it�s a good first start. Players from 2000 on up to Grandmaster should find this interesting reading. RECOMMENDED Meeting 1.d4 (Everyman Chess, 2002, 176 pages, figurine algebraic, $19.95) by Jacob Aagaard and Esben Lund, is a first rate work on the Tarrasch Defense to the Queen�s Gambit. This opening, which is not well covered in the chess literature, is ideally suited to players of a wide range of strengths from 1600 to Grandmaster. Black gains free mobility for his pieces at the cost of an isolated Queen pawn. The Tarrasch is a real work horse because it gives the user not only an answer to 1.d4 but it can also be employed against pretty much everything except 1.e4. For example, against the English, Black can play 1�e6 followed by �d5 and �c5. Danish IM Aagaard and his countryman Lund offer the reader a guide to all the main lines to the Tarrasch as well as systems against the Reti and other first moves. They employ the usual Everyman approach of grouping the material around model games, in this case, there are 69 of them. When I first received the book, I was very curious to see what the authors proposed against the currently popular plan of 9.Bg5 followed by 13.Rfd1 (1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. Nf3 c5 4. cxd5 exd5 5. g3 Nc6 6. Bg2 Nf6 7. O-O Be7 8. Nc3 O-O 9. Bg5 cxd4 10. Nxd4 h6 11. Be3 Re8 12. Qa4 Bd7 13. Rfd1). This variation was recently covered by IM Bosch in New in Chess Yearbook where his final conclusion was that Black was hurting. Aagaard and Lund put this variation in a footnote to game seven, and give 13.Rfd1 an exclamation mark, but come to the correct conclusion that Black has sufficient play after 13�Nb4 14.Qb3 a5 15.Nxd5 Nfxd5 16.Bxd5 Nxd5 17.Qxd5 Ba4. This evaluation was recently confirmed in Shulman-Akobian, Los Angeles 2002: 18. Qxd8 Raxd8 19. b3 Bd7 20. Kg2 a4 21. Rd3 Bf6 22. Rc1 Bg4 23. Rcd1 axb3 24. axb3 Bxd4 25. Rxd4 Rxd4 1/2-1/2. It�s hard to imagine Black generating any winning chances in this line, but there does seem to be full compensation for the pawn. The authors have done a good job of dealing with White attempts to avoid the Tarrasch Defense after 1.d4 d5. For example, their recommendation against the London System is very much to the point: 1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 e6 3.Bf4 Bd6! and Black is already equal. This book fills a serious gap in the chess literature. RECOMMENDED |